Roselyn Potter and Chamber of Secrets
by bleeding-roses-16
Summary: Finally! Roselyn Potter gets to go to Hogwarts. she's excited to finally start learning magic and making friends. unfortunately, something is going around attacking students... and why is Ginny being so withdrawn? Roselyn gets up to her own problems while attending her first year.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. I do own Roselyn**

**A/N: Here's the next part of my Roselyn Potter series. Hope you like! Please Read and Review**

Chapter 1: The Worst Birthday.

Roselyn groaned and buried her head further into her pillow when the sun's rays hit her face. Normally she would have jumped out of bed to wish Harry a happy birthday, but today, she just wished could pass as quickly as possible. Today was not only Harry's 12th birthday, but also the day that her Uncle was having an important business dinner with his boss.

Roselyn was just about to fall back to sleep when Hedwig started to screech and beat her wings against the cage, making her jump in surprise.

"shh! Hedwig! Please be quiet!" She said urgently as Harry also jumped off the bed from the top bunk and strode quickly over to his owl to pet her, trying to sush her. Unfortunately it wasn't fast enough because they heard their Uncle yelling,

"That blasted bird!" from his room. They exchanged uneasy looks as they both quickly got dressed, their backs to each other before quickly moving downstairs to get breakfast made. They had just managed to finish the meal and get it on the table when the Dursleys came in. Dudley immediately sat down and started to pig out, while Aunt Petunia eyed the food critically. Uncle Vernon sat down, his face red as he started to furiously eat a bit of his eggs. Finally he seemed to get to a boiling point and he slammed his fist down on the table, startling Roselyn, but Harry just brought his eyes up to meet his uncles in calm resignation.

"Third time this week!" Uncle Vernon roared across the table. "If you can't control that owl, it'll have to go!" Harry tried, yet again, to explain.

"She's bored," he said. "She's used to flying around outside. If I could just let her out at night -"

"Do I look stupid," snarled Uncle Vernon, a bit of fried egg dangling from his bushy mustache. Roselyn snorted and tried not to answer that. "I know what'll happen if that owl's let out."

He exchanged dark looks with his wife, Petunia. Harry tried to argue back but his words were drowned by a long, loud belch from Dudley.

"I want more bacon." He whined

"There's more in the frying pan, sweetums," said Aunt Petunia, turning misty eyes on her massive son. "We must build you up while we've got the chance ... I don't like the sound of that school food ..."

"Nonsense, Petunia, I never went hungry when I was at Smeltings," said Uncle Vernon heartily. "Dudley gets enough, don't you, son."

Roselyn looked at her Uncle in disbelief. Dudley was so big his bottom was drooping over the side of the chair. It was absolutely disgusting in Roselyn's opinion. Dudley turned to Harry and asked.

"Pass the frying pan."

"You've forgotten the magic word," said Harry irritably. The effect of this simple sentence on the rest of the family was incredible; Dudley gasped and fell off his chair with a crash that shook the whole kitchen; Mrs. Dursley gave a small scream and clapped her hands to her mouth; Mr. Dursley jumped to his feet, veins throbbing in his temples; Roselyn looked at her brother like he was an idiot, 'why can't he think before he speaks?' she wondered.

"I meant `please'!" said Harry quickly.

"I didn't mean -"

"WHAT HAVE I TOLD YOU," thundered his uncle, spraying spit over the table, "ABOUT SAYING THE `M' WORD IN OUR HOUSE."

"But I -"

"HOW DARE YOU THREATEN DUDLEY!" roared Uncle Vernon, pounding the table with his fist.

"I just -"

"I WARNED YOU! I WILL NOT TOLERATE MENTION OF YOUR ABNORMALITY UNDER THIS ROOF!"

Harry stared from his purple-faced uncle to his pale aunt, who was trying to heave Dudley to his feet, then finally to his sister who was looking down at her plate and shaking her head slightly.

"All right," said Harry, "all right. . . "

Uncle Vernon sat back down, breathing like a winded rhinoceros and watching Harry closely out of the corners of his small, sharp eyes. Ever since Harry had come home for the summer holidays, Uncle Vernon had been treating him and Roselyn like a bomb that might go off at any moment, because Harry Potter and Roselyn Potter weren't normal children.

As a matter of fact, they were as not normal as it is possible to be. Harry Potter was a wizard – a wizard fresh from his first year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. And Roselyn Potter was a witch just about to start at Hogwarts. Roselyn knew that Harry missed Hogwarts and couldn't wait to be back.

Roselyn simply couldn't wait to go and experience it all for herself. Though she would never tire of the stories her brother told. Even with some of the bad things that had happened to him. She had hoped that she would be able to look through some of Harry's school books so that she could be ready when the school year came up, but all Harry's spell books, his wand, robes, cauldron, and Nimbus Two Thousand broomstick had been locked in a cupboard under the stairs by Uncle Vernon the instant Harry had come home.

The Dursleys were what wizards called Muggles (not a drop of magical blood in their veins), and as far as they were concerned, having a wizard in the family was a matter of deepest shame. Uncle Vernon had even padlocked Harry's owl, Hedwig, inside her cage, to stop her from carrying messages to anyone in the wizarding world.

Harry and Roselyn looked nothing like the rest of the family, for that Roselyn thanked god everyday. Uncle Vernon was large and neck less, with an enormous black mustache; Aunt Petunia was horse-faced and bony; Dudley was blond, pink, and porky.

Roselyn was short and slender, her light red hair falling in soft waves down her back and she had clear sky blue eyes.

Harry, on the other hand, was also small and skinny, but a few inches taller, with brilliant green eyes and jet-black hair that was always untidy. He wore round glasses, and on his forehead was a thin, lightning-shaped scar. It was this scar that made Harry so particularly unusual, even for a wizard.

This scar was the only hint of Harry's very mysterious past, of the reason he and his sister had been left on the Dursleys' doorstep eleven years before. At the age of one year old, Harry had somehow survived a curse from the greatest Dark sorcerer of all time, Lord Voldemort, whose name most witches and wizards still feared to speak.

Harry and Roselyn's parents had died in Voldemort's attack, but Harry had escaped with his lightning scar, and somehow - nobody understood why – Voldemort's powers had been destroyed the instant he had failed to kill Harry, allowing his younger sister to survive as well.

So the Potter children had been brought up by their dead mother's sister and her husband. They had spent ten years with the Dursleys, never understanding why they kept making odd things happen without meaning to, believing the Dursleys' story that Harry had gotten his scar in the car crash that had killed their parents. And then, exactly a year ago, Hogwarts had written to Harry, and the whole story had come out. Harry had taken up his place at wizard school, where he, his scar and his sister were famous... but now the school year was over, and he was back with the Dursleys. Roselyn, who had been with the Dursleys for the whole year, was disappointed that they had gone back to treating her as badly as they did before Harry had left. She had liked the way they had treated her for the most part while Dudley and Harry had been gone. They weren't nice to her, but they hadn't been mean either.

Roselyn looked up when Uncle Vernon cleared his throat importantly and said, "Now, as we all know, today is a very important day."

Rosleyn just sighed, 'talking again about that blasted business dinner.' She thought irritably. He'd been talking of nothing else for two weeks. Some rich builder and his wife were coming to dinner and Uncle Vernon was hoping to get a huge order from him (Uncle Vernon's company made drills). She glanced over at Harry and wince when she saw him look up in disbelief. 'Oh Harry, you forgot about the dinner didn't you.' She thought sadly, he was about to get his hopes crushed. And sure enough, her Uncle continued.

"This could well be the day I make the biggest deal of my career, "said Uncle Vernon. Roselyn rolled her eyes, but she gave Harry a sympathetic look when she saw his dejected face, 'that was just an evil thing to do.' She thought.

"I think we should run through the schedule one more time," said Uncle Vernon.

"We should all be in position at eight o'clock. Petunia, you will be -."

"In the lounge," said Aunt Petunia promptly, "waiting to welcome them graciously to our home."

"Good, good. And Dudley."

"I'll be waiting to open the door." Dudley put on a foul, simpering smile. "May I take your coats, Mr. and Mrs. Mason."

"They'll _love_ him!" cried Aunt Petunia rapturously.

"Excellent, Dudley," said Uncle Vernon. Then he rounded on the siblings. "And _you two_."

"We'll be in our bedroom, making no noise and pretending we're not there," said Harry and Roselyn together, tonelessly.

"Exactly," said Uncle Vernon nastily. "I will lead them into the lounge, introduce you, Petunia, and pour them -drinks. At eight- fifteen -"

"I'll announce dinner," said Aunt Petunia.

"And, Dudley, you'll say -"

"May I take you through to the dining room, Mrs. Mason," said Dudley, offering his fat arm to an invisible woman.

"My perfect little gentleman!" sniffed Aunt Petunia.

"And _you two_," said Uncle Vernon viciously to Harry and Roselyn.

"We'll be in our room, making no noise and pretending we're not there," said Roselyn and Harry again dully.

"Precisely. Now, we should aim to get in a few good compliments at dinner. Petunia, any ideas?"

"Vernon tells me you're a _wonderful_ golfer, Mr. Mason... Do tell me where you bought your dress, Mrs. Mason ..."

"Perfect. . . Dudley."

"How about -'We had to write an essay about our hero at school, Mr. Mason, and _I_ wrote about _you_." This was too much for Aunt Petunia, Roselyn and Harry. Aunt Petunia burst into tears and hugged her son, while Harry and Roselyn ducked under the table so they wouldn't see them laughing. 'oh my goodness, they'd have to be so dumb to believe that one.' Roselyn thought humorously.

"And you two." They emerged from under the table, both fighting to keep straight faces.

"We'll be in our room, making no noise and pretending we're not there," they said in unison.

"Too right, you will," said Uncle Vernon forcefully. "The Masons don't know anything about you and it's going to stay that way. When dinner's over, you take Mrs. Mason back to the lounge for coffee, Petunia, and I'll bring the subject around to drills. With any luck, I'll have the deal signed and sealed before the news at ten. We'll be shopping for a vacation home in Majorca this time tomorrow."

Roselyn rolled her eyes again, she doubted that the Dursely's would even want to take them to Majorca, not that they would treat them any differently if they did.

"Right - I'm off into town to pick up the dinner jackets for Dudley and me. And you two," he snarled at Roselyn and Harry. "You stay out of your aunt's way while she's cleaning."

Harry left through the back door, Roselyn on his tail. It was a brilliant, sunny day. Harry and Roselyn crossed the lawn, slumped down on the garden bench, and Roselyn handed a card that she drew with a picture of him blowing out candles on a cake while she sang under her breath:

"Happy birthday to you... happy birthday to you. . ." Harry looked over to his sister and gave her a small smile.

"Happy Birthday Harry," She said sadly.

"Thanks Rosie," He said equally sad. Roselyn knew that he had been hoping to hear from his friends all summer, but neither of them had written to him, even though Ron had said he was going to ask Harry to come and stay. Roselyn was also missing her friend Ginny, who was Ron's younger sister, as well. Ginny and Roselyn had only ever met once very briefly, but they had been pen pals for almost a whole year. But once summer started, Ginny had seemed to quit writing.

Luckily, Harry hadn't told the Dursleys that he couldn't actually do magic without getting in trouble; Roselyn knew it was only their terror that he might turn them all into dung beetles that stopped them from locking the siblings in the cupboard under the stairs with Harry's wand and broomstick.

For the first couple of weeks back, Harry had enjoyed muttering nonsense words under his breath and watching Dudley tearing out of the room as fast as his fat legs would carry him, while Roselyn tried to keep her giggles in. But soon enough, Harry seemed to grow board of doing this. He never told Roselyn why, but she thought it probably had to do with the lack of contact from his friends.

Harry suddenly sat bolt upright on the garden bench, attracting a strange look from Roselyn.

"Rosie!" He whispered. "Do you see that?"

"What? Oh!" Roselyn caught sight of a pair of eyes as well and stared at them. Harry jumped to his feet just as a jeering voice floated across the lawn.

"I know what day it is," sang Dudley, waddling toward him. Roselyn watched the huge eyes blink and vanish.

"What?" said Harry, not taking his eyes off the spot where they had been.

"I know what day it is," Dudley repeated, coming right up to him.

"Well done," said Roselyn, also staring at the spot the eyes used to be, trying to decide if she had finally lost it.

"So you've finally learned the days of the week." Harry said sarcastically, making Roselyn giggle and pulled her eyes away from the bush to watch her brother and cousin.

"Today's your birthday," sneered Dudley. "How come you haven't got any cards. Haven't you even got friends at that freak place."

"Better not let your mum hear you talking about my school," said Harry coolly. Dudley hitched up his trousers, which were slipping down his fat bottom.

"Why're you staring at the hedge," he said suspiciously.

"I'm trying to decide what would be the best spell to set it on fire," said Harry. Dudley stumbled backward at once, a look of panic on his fat face. Roselyn sat back and hid her smile behind her hand, she knew Harry shouldn't do it, but he never listened, so she resigned herself to just sit back and enjoy for the moment.

"You c-can't - Dad told you you're not to do m-magic - he said he'll chuck you out of the house - and you haven't got anywhere else to go - you haven't got any friends to take you -"

"_Jiggery pokery!"_ said Harry in a fierce voice. "_Hocus pocus – squiggly wiggly -"_

"MUUUUUUM!" howled Dudley, tripping over his feet as he dashed back toward the house. "MUUUUM! He's doing you know what!"

Roselyn fell off the bench she laughed so hard, but Harry and Roselyn paid dearly for the moment of fun. As neither Dudley nor the hedge was in any way hurt, Aunt Petunia knew he hadn't really done magic, but to Roselyn's horror, he still had to duck as she aimed a heavy blow at his head with the soapy frying pan.

Then she gave them work to do, with the promise they wouldn't eat again until they'd finished. Giving a bunch of chores inside for Roselyn, even though she did not do anything.

While Dudley lolled around watching and eating ice cream, Harry was told to cleaned the windows, washed the car, mowed the lawn, trimmed the flowerbeds, pruned and watered the roses, and repainted the garden bench.

Roselyn on the other hand was told to clean the bathrooms, vacuum the rooms, dust the hallway pictures, clean the kitchen and help cook dinner.

Roselyn grumbled furiously under her breath at the unfairness. She wished that Harry had held his tongue just once. She knew that he was upset that his friends hadn't written him, she was as well, but he didn't need to get them in trouble today of all days. 'Then again, I could have stopped him.' She thought irritably, she wished she could learn to speak up, then again, Harry shouldn't need her to tell him when to stop.

It was half past seven, in the evening when at last, exhausted, they heard Aunt Petunia calling the two into the kitchen

"Get in here! And walk on the newspaper!"

Harry moved quickly into the shade of the gleaming kitchen as Roselyn slowly moved into the kitchen from the living room. On top of the fridge stood tonight's pudding: a huge mound of whipped cream and sugared violets. A loin of roast pork was sizzling in the oven.

"Eat quickly! The Masons will be here soon!" snapped Aunt Petunia, pointing to two slices of bread and a lump of cheese on the kitchen table and to another one next to his for Roselyn. She was already wearing a salmon-pink cocktail dress.

Harry and Roselyn quickly washed their hands and bolted down their pitiful suppers. The moment they had finished, Aunt Petunia whisked away their plates. "Upstairs! Hurry!"

When they passed the door to the living room, they caught a glimpse of Uncle Vernon and Dudley in bow ties and dinner jackets. He and his sister had only just reached the upstairs landing when the doorbell rang and Uncle Vernon's furious face appeared at the foot of the stairs.

"Remember, you two- one sound -"

Harry crossed to his bedroom on tiptoe with Roselyn, slipped inside, closed the door, and turned to collapse on their bunk bed. The trouble was, there was already someone sitting on it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. I do own Roselyn though.**

**A/N: Thanks for the reviews! Hopefully people will continue to write them. Here's another chapter! Please read and review.**

Chapter two: Dobby's Warning

Roselyn had to clamp her hand to her mouth to keep from screaming out in surprise. The little creature on the bed had large, bat-like ears and bulging green eyes the size of tennis balls. Roselyn knew instantly that this was what had been watching them out of the garden hedge that morning, though she wasn't quite sure what THIS was. Harry and Roselyn stared at the creature and it stared back, Roselyn heard Dudley's voice from the hall.

"May I take your coats, Mr. and Mrs. Mason?"

The creature slipped off the bed and bowed so low that the end of its long, thin nose touched the carpet. Roselyn noticed in surprise that it was wearing what looked like an old pillowcase, with rips for arm- and leg-holes.

"Er - hello," said Harry nervously.

"Harry Potter and Roselyn Potter!" said the creature in a high-pitched voice, making Roselyn wince, she just knew it would carry down the stairs to her Uncle. "So long has Dobby wanted to meet you, sir and miss... Such an honor it is . . . ."

"Th-thank you," said Harry, edging along the wall sinking into his desk chair, next to Hedwig, who was asleep in her large cage. "Who are you?"

"Dobby, sir. Just Dobby. Dobby the house-elf," said the creature.

"Oh - really?" said Harry. Roselyn moved so she was standing behind Harry's chair, looking at Dobby with wide, wary eyes. She had never seen anything like him… well except for maybe the goblins that ran Gringotts.

"Er - I don't want to be rude or anything, but - this isn't a great time for us to have a house-elf in our bedroom." Harry said bluntly. Aunt Petunia's high, false laugh sounded from the living room. The elf hung his head.

"Harry!" Roselyn hissed in his ear, she didn't know who he was and she was wary of him, but she didn't like the idea of hurting his feelings either. "You hurt his feelings!"

"Not that I'm not pleased to meet you," said Harry quickly, "but, er, is there any particular reason you're here?"

"Oh, yes, sir," said Dobby earnestly. "Dobby has come to tell you, sir ... it is difficult, sir ... Dobby wonders where to begin . . . ."

"Sit down," said Harry politely, pointing at the bed. To their horror, the elf burst into tears - very noisy tears.

_"S-sit down!"_ he wailed. "_Never_ ... _never ever_. . . " Roselyn thought she heard the voices downstairs falter. Roselyn glared at Harry and moved to kneel next to Dobby. She hesitantly put her arm around the house-elf to try and sooth him, hopping to calm him down enough to quiet down.

"I'm sorry," Harry whispered, "I didn't mean to offend you or anything -"

"Offend Dobby!" choked the elf. "Dobby has never been asked to sit down by a wizard - like an equal"

Harry, tried to say "Shh!" and look comforting at the same time, as Roselyn ushered Dobby back onto the bed where he sat hiccoughing, looking like a large and very ugly doll. At last he managed to control himself, and sat with his great eyes fixed on Harry in an expression of watery adoration.

"You can't have met many decent wizards," said Harry, trying to cheer him up. Dobby shook his head. Then, without warning, he leapt up, knocking a startled Roselyn off the bed, and started banging his head furiously on the window, shouting, "_Bad_ Dobby! _Bad_ Dobby!"

"Don't - what are you doing?" Harry hissed, springing up and pulling Dobby back onto the bed - Hedwig had woken up with a particularly loud screech and was beating her wings wildly against the bars of her cage.

"Dobby had to punish himself, sir," said the elf, who had gone slightly cross-eyed. "Dobby almost spoke ill of his family, sir . . . ."

"Your family?" Harry asked in confusion. Roselyn stood up and brushed off her pants listening intently for any sign that her Uncle was storming up the stairs.

"The wizard family Dobby serves, sir... Dobby is a house-elf - bound to serve one house and one family forever . ...

"Do they know you're here?" asked Harry curiously. Dobby shuddered.

"Oh, no, sir, no ... Dobby will have to punish himself most grievously for coming to see you, sir. Dobby will have to shut his ears in the oven door for this. If they ever knew, sir _"

"But won't they notice if you shut your ears in the oven door?" Harry asked while Roselyn hissed in anger that anyone would treat another being that way, regardless of if they are human or not.

"Dobby doubts it, sir. Dobby is always having to punish himself for something, sir. They lets Dobby get on with it, miss. Sometimes they reminds me to do extra punishments ..."

"But why don't you leave? Escape?" asked Harry.

"A house-elf must be set free, sir. And the family will never set Dobby free ... Dobby will serve the family until he dies, sir . . . ."

Harry and Roselyn stared in astonishment at him.

"And I thought we had it bad staying here for another four weeks," Harry said. "This makes the Dursleys sound almost human. Can't anyone help you? Can't I?" Almost at once, Roselyn wished he hadn't spoken. Dobby dissolved again into wails of gratitude.

"Please," Roselyn whispered frantically, looking fearfully at the door. "Please be quiet. If the Dursleys hear anything, if they know you're here -"

"Harry Potter asks if he can help Dobby ... Dobby has heard of the Potter's greatness, sir, but of your goodness, Dobby never knew ..."

Harry, who was blushing a rather impressive shade of red, said, "Whatever you've heard about my greatness is a load of rubbish. I'm not even top of my year at Hogwarts; that's Hermione, she -" But he stopped quickly, a look of hurt crossing his face briefly, and Roselyn looked at him sympathetically.

"Harry Potter is humble and modest," said Dobby reverently, his orb-like eyes aglow. "Harry Potter speaks not of his triumph over He-Who- Must-Not-Be-Named -"

"Voldemort?" said Harry.

Dobby clapped his hands over his bat ears and moaned, "Ah, speak not the name, sir! Speak not the name!"

"Sorry" said Harry quickly. "I know lots of people don't like it. My friend Ron -"

He stopped again, another look of hurt crossing his face. Dobby leaned toward Harry, his eyes wide as headlights.

"Dobby heard tell," he said hoarsely, "that Harry Potter met the Dark Lord for a second time just weeks ago ... that Harry Potter escaped _yet again_. "

"I don't know what you're talking about," He said quickly as Dobby's eyes suddenly shone with tears. Roselyn gave him a sideways glance before looking back at Dobby.

"Ah, sir," he gasped, dabbing his face with a corner of the grubby pillowcase he was wearing. "Harry Potter is valiant and bold! He has braved so many dangers already! But Dobby has come to protect Harry Potter and Roselyn Potter, to warn them, even if he does have to shut his ears in the oven door later... _Harry Potter and Roselyn Potter must not go back to Hogwarts."_

There was a silence broken only by the chink of knives and forks from downstairs and the distant rumble of Uncle Vernon's voice.

"What?" Roselyn finally broke that silence, her heart finally feeling like it was beating again. There was no way she was going to miss out on going to Hogwarts, not if it meant getting out of this house, and not after all Harry had told her about it.

"W-what?" Harry stammered after her. "But I've got to go back - term starts on September first. Roselyn hasn't even been yet. It's all that's keeping us going. You don't know what it's like here. We don't _belong_ here. We belong in your world - at Hogwarts."

"No, no, no," squeaked Dobby, shaking his head so hard his ears flapped. "Harry Potter and Roselyn Potter must stay where they is safe. They is too great, too good, to lose. If Harry Potter or Roselyn Potter goes back to Hogwarts, they will be in mortal danger."

"Why?" said Roselyn in alarm, she did not think that Hogwarts was a dangerous, despite the trouble her brother and his friends got into the previous year, she felt that everyone else who wasn't nosy had been perfectly safe.

"There is a plot, Roselyn Potter. A plot to make most terrible things happen at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry this year," whispered Dobby, suddenly trembling all over. "Dobby has known it for months, miss. Potters must not put themselves in peril. They is too important, miss!"

"What terrible things?" said Harry at once, being slightly demanding. "Who's plotting them?"

Dobby made a funny choking noise and then banged his head frantically against the wall.

"All right!" cried Harry, grabbing the elf's arm to stop him. "You can't tell us. I understand. But why are you warning us?" A sudden, thought seemed to strike him. "Hang on - this hasn't got anything to do with Vol - sorry - with You-Know-Who, has it? You could just shake or nod," he added hastily as Dobby's head tilted worryingly close to the wall again. Slowly, Dobby shook his head.

"Not -not _He- Who-Must-Not-Be-Named,_ sir -'

But Dobby's eyes were wide and he seemed to be trying to give Harry a hint. Roselyn gave a baffled look to Harry, seeing that he was just as lost as she was, before looking back to Dobby.

"He hasn't got a brother, has he?" Harry asked. Dobby shook his head, his eyes wider than ever.

"Well then, I can't think who else would have a chance of making horrible things happen at Hogwarts," said Harry. "I mean, there's Dumbledore, for one thing - you know who Dumbledore is, don't you?"

Dobby bowed his head.

"Albus Dumbledore is the greatest headmaster Hogwarts has ever had. Dobby knows it, sir. Dobby has heard Dumbledore's powers rival those of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named at the height of his strength. But, sir" - Dobby's voice dropped to an urgent whisper - "there are powers Dumbledore doesn't ... powers no decent wizard. . ."

And before Harry or Roselyn could stop him, Dobby bounded off the bed, seized the desk lamp, and started beating himself around the head with earsplitting yelps. A sudden silence fell downstairs.

Two seconds later Roselyn, heart thudding madly, heard Uncle Vernon coming into the hall, calling, "Dudley must have left his television on again, the little tyke!"

"Quick! In the closet!" hissed Harry, stuffing Dobby in, shutting the door, and flinging himself onto the bed next to his sister just as the door handle turned.

"What - the - _devil_ - are - you – two - doing?" said Uncle Vernon through gritted teeth, his face horribly close to Harry's. "You've just ruined the punch line of my Japanese golfer joke... One more sound and you'll wish you'd never been born, you two!" He stomped flat-footed from the room.

Shaking, Harry let Dobby out of the closet as Roselyn walked shakily across the room to listen at the door to make sure Uncle Vernon had indeed left.

"See what it's like here?" Harry said. "See why we've got to go back to Hogwarts? It's the only place we've got - well, I _think_ we've got friends. "

"Friends who don't even _write_ to Roselyn Potter or Harry Potter?" said Dobby slyly.

"I expect they've just been - wait a minute," said Harry, frowning. "How do you know out friends haven't been writing to us?"

Dobby shuffled his feet, causing Roselyn to look closer at him, seeming to understand where he was going with this.

"Harry Potter and Roselyn Potter mustn't be angry with Dobby. Dobby did it for the best - "

_"Have you been stopping our letters?"_ Harry asked angrily.

"Dobby has them here, sir," said the elf. Stepping nimbly out of Harry's reach, he pulled a thick wad of envelopes from the inside of the pillowcase he was wearing. Roselyn could make out what she thought was Hermione's neat writing, Ron's untidy scrawl, even a scribble that she recognized from the Hogwarts gamekeeper, Hagrid. Roselyn was also able to see a few letters with Ginny's quick script. Dobby blinked anxiously up at Harry and Roselyn.

"Harry Potter and Roselyn Potter mustn't be angry... Dobby hoped ... if Harry Potter and Roselyn Potter thought their friends had forgotten them... Harry Potter and Roselyn Potter might not want to go back to school, sir... miss…" Harry, as usual when he was mad, wasn't listening. He made a grab for the letters, but Dobby jumped out of reach.

"Harry Potter will have them, sir, if he gives Dobby his word that he and Roselyn Potter will not return to Hogwarts. Ah, sir, this is a danger you must not face! Say you won't go back, sir!"

"No," said Harry angrily. "Give me our friends' letters!"

"Then Harry Potter and Roselyn Potter leaves Dobby no choice," said the elf sadly.

Before Harry or Roselyn could move, Dobby had darted to the bedroom door, pulled it open, and sprinted down the stairs. Mouth dry, stomach lurching, and heart racing, Roselyn sprinted out the door after Harry who had sprang after him, trying not to make a sound. Roselyn watched anxiously as Harry jumped the last six steps, landing catlike on the hall carpet, looking around for Dobby.

From the dining room she heard Uncle Vernon saying, ". . . tell Petunia that very funny story about those American plumbers, Mr. Mason. She's been dying to hear. . . "

Harry ran up the hall into the kitchen with Roselyn close behind and what they saw made Roselyn let out an almost silent gasp as she felt like she had just been sucker punched in the gut. Aunt Petunia's masterpiece of a pudding, the mountain of cream and sugared violets, was floating up near the ceiling.

On top of a cupboard in the corner crouched Dobby.

"No," croaked Harry. "Please... they'll kill us…."

"Harry Potter must say he and Roselyn Potter is not going back to school -"

"Dobby... please..."

"Say it, sir -"

"I can't -"

Dobby gave them a tragic look. "Then Dobby must do it, sir, for Potters' own good." The pudding fell to the floor with a heart-stopping crash.

Cream splattered the windows and walls as the dish shattered. With a crack like a whip, Dobby vanished.

There were screams from the dining room and Uncle Vernon burst into the kitchen to find Harry, rigid with shock, covered from head to foot in Aunt Petunia's pudding. Roselyn, who had luckily been standing behind Harry, had missed most of the blow.

At first, it looked as though Uncle Vernon would manage to gloss the whole thing over. ("Just our nephew and our niece - very disturbed – both of them - meeting strangers upsets them, so we kept them upstairs…") He shooed the shocked Masons back into the dining room, promised Harry he would flay him to within an inch of his life when the Masons had left, and handed him and his sister each a mop. Aunt Petunia dug some ice cream out of the freezer and Harry, still shaking, started scrubbing the kitchen clean with his obviously frightened sister.

Uncle Vernon might still have been able to make his deal - if it hadn't been for the owl. Aunt Petunia was just passing around a box of after-dinner mints when a huge barn owl swooped through the dining room window, dropped a letter on Mrs. Mason's head, and swooped out again.

Mrs. Mason screamed like a banshee and ran from the house shouting about lunatics. Mr. Mason stayed just long enough to tell the Dursleys that his wife was mortally afraid of birds of all shapes and sizes, and to ask whether this was their idea of a joke.

Harry stood in front of Roselyn there in the kitchen, clutching the mop for support as Roselyn clutched the back of his shirt in fear, as Uncle Vernon advanced on him, a demonic glint in his tiny eyes.

"Read it!" he hissed evilly, brandishing the letter the owl had delivered. "Go on - read it!"

Harry took it and Roselyn got the feeling that it did not contain birthday greetings. She was proved right when she saw that it said,

Dear Mr. Potter,

We have received intelligence that a Hover Charm was used at your place of residence this evening at twelve minutes past nine.

As you know, underage wizards are not permitted to perform spells outside school, and further spellwork on your part may lead to expulsion from said school (Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery, 1875, Paragraph C).

We would also ask you to remember that any magical activity that risks notice by members of the non-magical community (Muggles) is a serious offense under section 13 of the International Confederation of Warlocks' Statute of Secrecy.

Enjoy your holidays!

Yours sincerely,

Mafalda Hopkirk

IMPROPER USE OF MAGIC OFFICE

_Ministry of Magic_

Roselyn looked up and started to back away slowly when she saw her Uncles furious face.

"You didn't tell us you weren't allowed to use magic outside school," said Uncle Vernon, a mad gleam dancing in his eyes.

"Forgot to mention it... Slipped your mind, I daresay..."

He was bearing down on Harry like a great bulldog, all his teeth bared. "Well, I've got news for you, boy... I'm locking you and that girl up... You're never going back to that school... never... and if you try and magic yourself out - they'll expel you! You'll never even get to see it girl!"

And laughing like a maniac, he dragged Harry and Roselyn back upstairs.

Uncle Vernon was as bad as his word. The following morning, he paid a man to fit bars on Roselyn and Harry's window. He himself fitted a cat-flap in the bedroom door, so that small amounts of food could be pushed inside three times a day. They let Harry and Roselyn out to use the bathroom morning and evening. Otherwise, they were locked in the room around the clock.

Three days later, the Dursleys were showing no sign of relenting, Roselyn was confused as to why Harry got in trouble when it could have been her performing accidental magic, when she asked Harry he shrugged helplessly, stating that he didn't know. Life at Privet Drive had reached an all-time low. Now that the Dursleys knew they weren't going to wake up as fruit bats, they had lost their only weapon.

Dobby might have saved the Potters from horrible happenings at Hogwarts, but the way things were going, they'd probably starve to death anyway.

The cat-flap rattled and Aunt Petunias hand appeared, pushing two bowls of canned soup into the room. Roselyn watched dully as Harry leapt across the room to grab them. He handed her one of the bowls, which she slowly sipped, ignoring the taste, and watched as Harry gulped half of his down in one go before pouring the rest into Hedwig's food dish.

She ruffled her feathers and gave him a look of deep disgust.

"It's no good turning your beak up at it - that's all we've got," said Harry grimly.

Roselyn silently handed her bowl over to Harry, who put the empty bowl back on the floor next to the cat-flap and climbed up to lay back down on the top bunk. Roselyn just sat on the bed and stared silently, not having much energy to do anything from the lack of food.

She thought about what would happen in another four weeks, what would happen if they didn't turn up at Hogwarts? Would someone be sent to see why they never showed up? Would they be able to make the Dursleys let them go? The room was growing dark.

As soon as she heard Harry fell asleep, Roselyn got up and went to her desk where her art book was and sat down to look at the pictures, she had been very unmotivated since their imprisonment and what she did draw usually came out dark and morbid. She sighed heavily, picking up a pencil to try and draw something, even if it was dark. Suddenly Roselyn heard the sound of a car engine and looked up curiously. She then had to stifle a scream when she saw a blue car with three red-haired boys in it. She smiled at them when she recognized the youngest.

It seemed that Ron Weasley had come to their rescue.


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything Harry Potter. I only own Rose.**

Chapter 3: The Burrow

"_Ron_!" breathed Harry, startling Roselyn since she hadn't realized he had woken up. Harry crept over to the window to open it up so that they could talk through the bars. "Ron, how did you - What the -?"

Harry's mouth fell open as the full impact of what he was seeing hit him, something that Roselyn was still trying to wrap her brain around. Ron was leaning out of the back window of an old turquoise car, which was parked in midair. Grinning at them from the front seats were twins that Roselyn guessed were Fred and George from Ginny's description.

"All right, Harry? Roselyn?" asked twin one.

"What's been going on?" said Ron. "Why haven't you been answering my letters and why hasn't Roselyn answered Ginny's? We've both asked you both to stay about twelve times, and then Dad came home and said you'd got an official warning for using magic in front of Muggles -"

"It wasn't me - and how did he know?"

"He works for the Ministry," said Ron. "You know we're not supposed to do spells outside school -"

"Bit rich coming from you," said Harry, staring at the floating car, Roselyn silently agreeing as she watched with an open mouth, already trying to think of how many enchantments were on the car.

"Oh, this doesn't count," said Ron. "We're only borrowing this. It's Dad's, we didn't enchant it. But doing magic in front of those Muggles you live with -"

"I told you, I didn't - but it'll take too long to explain now look, can you tell them at Hogwarts that the Dursleys have locked us up and won't let us come back, and obviously I can't magic us out, because the Ministry'Il think that's the second spell I've done in three days, so -" Roselyn looked at her brother in disbelief, she did not think that they drove all this way to just leave them there, especially not since they had seen what was going on with them.

"Stop gibbering," said Ron, proving her thoughts right. "We've come to take you home with us."

"But you can't magic us out either -"

"We don't need to," said Ron, jerking his head toward the front seat and grinning. "You forget who I've got with me."

"Tie that around the bars," said George, throwing the end of a rope to Harry.

"If the Dursleys wake up, we're dead," said Harry as he tied the rope tightly around a bar and Fredq revved up the car.

"Don't worry," said Fred, "and stand back."

Harry and Roselyn moved back into the shadows next to Hedwig, who seemed to have realized how important this was and kept still and silent.

The car revved louder and louder and suddenly, with a crunching noise, the bars were pulled clean out of the window as they drove straight up in the air. Roselyn stayed next to Hedwig while Harry ran back to the window to see the bars dangling a few feet above the ground. Panting, Ron hoisted them up into the car.

Roselyn listened anxiously, but there was no sound from the Dursleys' bedroom. When the bars were safely in the back seat with Ron, they reversed as close as possible to Harry's window.

"Get in," Ron said.

" But all my Hogwarts stuff - my wand - my broomstick -"

"Where is it?"

"Locked in the cupboard under the stairs, and we can't get out of this room -"

"No problem," said George from the front passenger seat. "Out of the way, Harry."

Fred and George climbed catlike through the window into their room, you had to hand it to them, thought the Potter siblings, as George took an ordinary hairpin from his pocket and started to pick the lock.

"A lot of wizards think it's a waste of time, knowing this sort of Muggle trick," said Fred, "but we feel they're skills worth learning, even if they are a bit slow." There was a small click and the door swung open.

"So - we'll get your trunk - you grab anything you need from your room and hand it out to Ron," whispered George.

"Watch out for the bottom stair - it creaks," Harry whispered back as the twins disappeared onto the dark landing.

Harry dashed across their room to Roselyn.

"Grab everything you need for Hogwarts and pass them to Ron." Then he went to help Fred and George heave his trunk up the stairs.

Roselyn quickly grabbed her bag of cloths that she kept in the wardrobe and threw her art book and pencils into it before passing it threw the window to Ron. After Ron put her bag in the front of the car he turned to Roselyn and held his hands out to her

"Come on! Get in." Roselyn hesitated, looking down the window to the ground, before looking uncertainly at Ron

"But what if I fall?" she whispered just loud enough for the red headed boy to hear her. Ron blinked in surprise before smiling reassuringly at her

"I'll catch you, don't worry. On, three, okay?" Roselyn bit her lip and nodded reluctently. "Alright, don't look down. One-two-three." When he got to three Roselyn leapt the short distance to the car and Ron caught her around the waist and hauled her in.

Roselyn climbed into the front of the car when Fred climbed back into the car to pull Harry's trunk in with Ron, and Harry and George pushed from the bedroom side. Uncle Vernon coughed again.

"A bit more," panted Fred, who was pulling from inside the car.

"One good push -"

Harry and George threw their shoulders against the trunk and it slid out of the window into the back seat of the car.

"Okay, let's go," George whispered and jumped in himself.

But as Harry climbed onto the windowsill there came a sudden loud screech from behind him, followed immediately by the thunder of Uncle Vernon's voice.

"THAT RUDDY OWL!"

"I've forgotten Hedwig!"

Harry tore back across the room as the landing light clicked on – he snatched up Hedwig's cage, dashed to the window, and passed it out to Roselyn who had switched places with George and was sitting in the back seat again. He was scrambling back onto the chest of drawers when Uncle Vernon hammered on the unlocked door and it crashed open.

For a split second, Uncle Vernon stood framed in the doorway; then he let out a bellow like an angry bull and dived at Harry, grabbing him by the ankle.

Roselyn, Ron, and George seized Harry's arms and pulled as hard as they could, and Fred grabbed the steering wheel to keep the car from crashing back into the side of the house.

"Petunia!" roared Uncle Vernon. "They're getting away! THEY'RE GETTING AWAY!"

But the Weasleys and Roselyn gave a gigantic tug and Harry's leg slid out of Uncle Vernon's grasp. As soon as Harry was in the car and had slammed the door shut Ron yelled, "Put your foot down, Fred!" and the car shot suddenly toward the moon.

Roselyn couldn't believe it - they were free. She watched as Harry rolled down the window, the night air whipping his hair, and looked back at the shrinking rooftops of Privet Drive. Uncle Vernon, Aunt Petunia, and Dudley were all hanging, dumbstruck, out of there window.

"See you next summer!" Harry yelled.

The Weasleys and Roselyn roared with laughter and Harry settled back in his seat, grinning from ear to ear.

"So Rose," Harry said. "I know you remember Ron but these are his older brothers, Fred, and George Weasley."

"Nice to meet you," Roselyn said, slightly out of breath and still in wonder at what just transpired, her heart seeming to think it was okay to start beating again.

"Good to meet the other person Ginny won't stop talking about," Fred grinned, leaving Roselyn to smile knowingly back at him.

"Let Hedwig out," Harry told Ron. "She can fly behind us. She hasn't had a chance to stretch her wings for ages."

George handed the hairpin to Ron and, a moment later, Hedwig soared joyfully out of the window to glide alongside them like a ghost.

"So - what's the story, Harry?" said Ron impatiently. "What's been happening?"

Harry told them all about Dobby, the warning he'd given them and the fiasco of the violet pudding, with help from Roselyn. There was a long, shocked silence when he had finished.

"Very fishy," said Fred finally.

"Definitely dodgy" agreed George. "So he wouldn't even tell you who's supposed to be plotting all this stuff?"

"I don't think he could," said Harry. "I told you, every time he got close to letting something slip, he started banging his head against the wall."

She saw Fred and George look at each other.

"What, you think he was lying to us?" asked Harry. Roselyn frowned, she did not think that Dobby would have gone through that much trouble and pain just to lie to them.

"Well," said Fred, "put it this way - house-elves have got powerful magic of their own, but they can't usually use it without their master's permission. I reckon old Dobby was sent to stop you coming back to Hogwarts. Someone's idea of a joke. Can you think of anyone at school with a grudge against you?"

"Yes," said Harry and Ron together, instantly.

"Who?" Roselyn asked in disbelief, she didn't think anyone that weren't the Dursleys, or those being deluded by them, could dislike Harry, he was much too nice.

"Draco Malfoy," Harry explained. "He hates me."

"Draco Malfoy?" said George, turning around. "Not Lucius Malfoy's son?"

"Must be, it's not a very common name, is it?" said Harry.

"I've heard Dad talking about him," said George. "He was a big supporter of You-Know-Who."

"And when You-Know-Who disappeared," said Fred, craning around to look at the Potters, "Lucius Malfoy came back saying he'd never meant any of it. Load of dung - Dad reckons he was right in You-Know-Who's inner circle."

Roselyn looked at the four boys, bewildered.

"Who's Draco Malfoy?" she asked. Harry turned to her and explained quickly

"He's just this boy in Ron and I's year that's a bully. He kind of makes Dudley look sweet." Roselyn blinked in surprise. She didn't think anyone could get meaner than Dudley. Harry turned back to the Weasleys,

"I don't know whether the Malfoy's own a house-elf," said Harry.

"Well, whoever owns him will be an old wizarding family, and they'll be rich," said Fred. "Yeah, Mum's always wishing we had a house-elf to do the ironing," said George. "But all we've got is a lousy old ghoul in the attic and gnomes all over the garden. House-elves come with big old manors and castles and places like that; you wouldn't catch one in our house."

Harry was silent and Roselyn knew that he was doubting himself. But Roselyn still didn't think that Dobby was acting on anyone's orders.

"I'm glad we came to get you, anyway," said Ron. "I was getting really worried when you didn't answer any of my letters. Ginny was panicking too, Roselyn. We thought it was Errol's fault at first -"

"Who's Errol?" Harry asked. Roselyn snorted, she wouldn't be surprised if that old owl just killed over on one of his deliveries.

"Our owl. He's ancient. It wouldn't be the first time he'd collapsed on a delivery. So then I tried to borrow Hermes -"

"Who?" they both asked this time.

"The owl Mum and Dad bought Percy when he was made prefect," said Fred from the front.

"But Percy wouldn't lend him to me," said Ron. "Said he needed him."

"Percy's been acting very oddly this summer," said George, frowning. "And he has been sending a lot of letters and spending a load of time shut up in his room... I mean, there's only so many times you can polish a prefect badge... You're driving too far west, Fred," he added, pointing at a compass on the dashboard. Fred twiddled the steering wheel.

"So, does your dad know you've got the car?" asked Roselyn, but she rather thought she knew the answer..

"Er, no," said Ron, "he had to work tonight. Hopefully we'll be able to get it back in the garage without Mum noticing we flew it."

"What does your dad do at the Ministry of Magic, anyway?" Harry asked curiously.

"He works in the most boring department," said Ron. "The Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office."

"The what?" the siblings asked.

"It's all to do with bewitching things that are Muggle-made, you know, in case they end up back in a Muggle shop or house. Like, last year, some old witch died and her tea set was sold to an antiques shop. This Muggle woman bought it, took it home, and tried to serve her friends tea in it. It was a nightmare - Dad was working overtime for weeks."

"What happened?" Roselyn asked curiously.

"The teapot went berserk and squirted boiling tea all over the place and one man ended up in the hospital with the sugar tongs clamped to his nose. Dad was going frantic - it's only him and an old warlock called Perkins in the office -and they had to do Memory Charms and all sorts of stuff to cover it up -"

"But your dad - this car -" Harry started

Fred laughed. "Yeah, Dad's crazy about everything to do with Muggles; our shed's full of Muggle stuff. He takes it apart, puts spells on it, and puts it back together again. If he raided our house he'd have to put himself under arrest. It drives Mum mad."

"That's the main road," said George, peering down through the windshield. "We'll be there in ten minutes ... Just as well, it's getting light . . . ."

A faint pinkish glow was visible along the horizon to the east. Fred brought the car lower, and Harry and Roselyn saw a dark patchwork of fields and clumps of trees.

"We're a little way outside the village," said George. "Ottery St. Catchpole."

Lower and lower went the flying car. The edge of a brilliant red sun was now gleaming through the trees.

"Touchdown!" said Fred as, with a slight bump, they hit the ground. They had landed next to a tumbledown garage in a small yard, and the Potter siblings looked out for the first time at Ron's house.

It looked as though it had once been a large stone pigpen, but extra rooms had been added here and there until it was several stories high and so crooked Roselyn thought that if a muggle had seen it, they would have to accept magic was real, or start working on some new law's of gravity. Four or five chimneys were perched on top of the red roof. A lopsided sign stuck in the ground near the entrance read, THE BURROW. Around the front door lay a jumble of rubber boots and a very rusty cauldron. Several fat brown chickens were pecking their way around the yard.

"It's not much," said Ron.

"It's wonderful," said Harry happily.

"Amazing," Roselyn agreed, slack-jawed. They all piled out of the car.

"Now, we'll go upstairs really quietly," said Fred, "and wait for Mum to call us for breakfast Then, Ron, you come bounding downstairs going, `Mum, Ginny, look who turned up in the night!' and they'll both be all pleased to see Harry and Roselyn and no one need ever know we flew the car." Roselyn looked at them as though they lost her head, she did not think that the plan was fool proof. And if it did work then she would loose a considerable amount of respect for their mother.

"Right," said Ron. "Come on, Harry, Roselyn you can stay with us until Ginny gets up, I sleep at the - at the top…" Ron had gone a nasty greenish color, his eyes fixed on the house.

The other four wheeled around. Mrs. Weasley was marching across the yard, scattering chickens, and for a short, plump, kind-faced woman, it was remarkable how much she looked like a saber-toothed tiger.

"Ah," said Fred.

"Oh, dear," said George.

Mrs. Weasley came to a halt in front of them, her hands on her hips, staring from one guilty face to the next. She was wearing a flowered apron with a wand sticking out of the pocket.

"So," she said.

"Morning, Mum," said George, in what he clearly thought was a jaunty, winning voice.

"Have you any idea how worried I've been?" said Mrs. Weasley in a deadly whisper.

"Sorry, Mum, but see, we had to -"

All three of Mrs. Weasley's sons were taller than she was, but they cowered as her rage broke over them.

"_Beds empty! No note! Car gone_ … could have crashed … out of my mind with worry …did you care? …never, as long as I've lived…you wait until your father gets home, we never had trouble like this from Bill or Charlie or Percy …"

"Perfect Percy," muttered Fred.

"YOU COULD DO WITH TAKING A LEAF OUT OF PERCY'S BOOK!" yelled Mrs. Weasley, prodding a finger in Fred's chest. "You could have died, you could have been seen, you could have lost your father his job -"

It seemed to go on for hours. Mrs. Weasley had shouted herself hoarse before she turned on Harry and Roselyn, who backed away.

"I'm very pleased to see you, Harry, dear. Oh! And its nice to see you again Roselyn," she said. "Come in and have some breakfast."

She turned and walked back into the house and Roselyn looked at Harry, who looked at Ron, who nodded encouragingly.

The kitchen was small and rather cramped. There was a scrubbed wooden table and chairs in the middle, and Harry and Roselyn sat down on the edge of their seats, looking around. They had never been in a wizard house before.

The clock on the wall opposite him had only one hand and no numbers at all. Written around the edge were things like Time to make tea, Time to feed the chickens, and You're late. Books were stacked three deep on the mantelpiece, books with titles like Charm Your Own Cheese, Enchantment in Baking, and One Minute Feasts - It's Magic! And Roselyn heard the old radio next to the sink had just announced that coming up was "Witching Hour, with the popular singing sorceress, Celestina Warbeck."

Mrs. Weasley was clattering around, cooking breakfast a little haphazardly, throwing dirty looks at her sons as she threw sausages into the frying pan. Every now and then she muttered things like "don't know what you were thinking of," and "never would have believed it."

"I don't blame you, dears," she assured Harry and Roselyn, tipping eight or nine sausages onto Harry's plate.

"Arthur and I have been worried about you, too. Just last night we were saying we'd come and get you ourselves if you hadn't written back to Ron by Friday. But really," (she was now adding three fried eggs to Roselyn's plate) "flying an illegal car halfway across the country - anyone could have seen you -"

She flicked her wand casually at the dishes in the sink, which began to clean themselves, clinking gently in the background.

"It was cloudy, Mum!" said Fred.

"You keep your mouth closed while you're eating!" Mrs. Weasley snapped.

"They were starving them, Mum!" said George.

"And you!" said Mrs. Weasley, but it was with a slightly softened expression that she started cutting Roselyn's bread and buttering it for her.

At that moment there was a diversion in the form of a small, redheaded figure in a long nightdress, who appeared in the kitchen, gave a small squeal, and gasped, "Roselyn?"

"Ginny!" Roselyn replied, jumping from her chair and they met in a tight hug.

They let go and Ginny's eyes made their way to Harry. She squealed again, going scarlet and turned around, racing up the stairs.

"Thank you for breakfast Mrs. Weasley," Roselyn said, gave a quick grin to her brother and followed the other red-headed girl up the stairs. She followed Ginny up to the third landing where she was let into the room quickly before Ginny closed the door with a snap.

Ginny spun around to face Roselyn, her face still a brilliant red color. Roselyn smiled at her

"I don't know about you, but I think someone has a crush on my brother." Ginny groaned and buried her head in her hands.

"I'm sorry. That was so embarrassing." Roselyn smiled in amusement at her.

"So do you? Have a crush on Harry, I mean." Ginny nodded her head shyly and Roselyn just laughed

"Well, if you want to win his heart then you have to learn to be yourself." She said brightly. Ginny bit her lip and looked at her strangely.

"You don't find it strange that I have a crush on your brother?" Roselyn shook her head.

"No, not really. I mean, I understand, he's really nice and polite all the time. If I found a boy like that who's not related to me I'd probably like them too." Ginny walked over to her bed and dropped down on it.

"Yeah, I guess. But let's get off that topic…. For that matter let me get dressed." Roselyn smiled and clapped her hands

"Ohhh, let me help you pick something out!" she said.

"Alright, but I don't have that many choice's" Ginny just laughed and nodded. Roselyn just shrugged.

"So? They've got to better then what I've got." She said gesturing to her cloths that had once been Dudleys. Ginny wrinkled up her nose at the cloths that hung limply off of Roselyn's body.

"Where did you get those? They look awful on you. Not to mention they look like boy cloths." Roselyn laughed sardonically

"They're my cousin Dudley's from when he was seven. Harry and I don't ever get new cloths." Ginny frowned a moment before cheering up

"Hey, why don't you wear some of my stuff? Then you can get new things when we go to Diagon Ally." Ginny suggested. Roselyn brightened up.

"Really? Thanks Ginny!" They riffled threw Ginny's cloths for a moment when Roselyn found a brown pinafore that she thought would go great with Ginny's eyes and found a light blue pinafore for herself that Ginny said she could borrow. By the time they were both dressed they could hear the boys coming up the steps. To Roselyn's amusement, Ginny got excited at the chance to see Harry again and opened the door to peek out. Though it seemed that he and Ron had just reached the landing, when Harry looked at her, Ginny squeaked and slammed the door shut, causing Roselyn to erupt into giggles. She thought her friend was just to funny and she got the feeling she would love it here.


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, as much as I dream that I did. I do own Roselyn.**

Chapter 4: The burrow part 2

It didn't take long for their giggles to die down. When they did, Ginny turned to Roselyn and said,

"Come on, I'll take you on a tour, but let me go get something to eat first." Roselyn smiled and gestured for her to lead the way.

"I'll follow you then." She told Ginny. When the two girls made it downstairs, Roselyn saw an older red-headed man that she assumed was Mr. Weasley.

"Morning Dad! Morning Mum!" Ginny said brightly. Both her parents smiled at her,

"Morning sweetheart." Her dad said.

"So Rose, this is my Dad Arthur, Dad, this is Roselyn Potter." She introduced as the girls sat down. Arthur blinked and looked up, when he saw Roselyn he smiled excitedly and shook her hand enthusiastically.

"Oh! Pleased to meet you Roselyn! I've just met your brother. We're so pleased you're staying with us." He said. Rose smiled at him.

"Pleased to meet you as well , but please, call me Rose." She said, taking a seat next to Ginny who was quickly eating what Mrs. Weasley had placed in front of her.

"Would you like anymore dear?" asked. Roselyn smiled but shook her head.

"No thanks Mrs. Weasley, I think you gave me enough the first time around." She said politely.

"Alright then, if you change your mind just say so." Mrs. Weasley said before getting her own plate and sitting down to eat.

"What are you girls going to do today?" Mr. Weasley asked them when he finally put the newspaper down. Roselyn shrugged and looked over to Ginny, who had to swallow before saying.

"I was going to give Rose the tour then I thought maybe we could go out and swim in the little river close by." Roselyn froze and shot a wide eyed look at Ginny.

"Uhhh, I don't have a swim suit." She said.

"That's okay, I have an extra one that should fit you." Ginny said as she stood up and took her plate over to the sink.

"That sounds fun. Remember to be careful!" He said before turning to Mrs. Weasley to start talking about something or another. Before Roselyn could listen in on what they were saying, Ginny grabbed her arm and started tugging her away.

"Okay, so that was obviously the kitchen, this is the living room." She said, gesturing to said room before quickly walking up the stairs, Roselyn trailing behind her. "Mom's and Dad's room is on this first landing, Percy's room is this first landing, the twins are on the second landing, of course you already know I'm on the third, we have two empty rooms on the fourth and fifth landing that belonged to bill and Charlie and Ron is at the top." Ginny said as she led Roselyn back to her room. "Okay, now lets go play in the water." She said excitedly. Roselyn grimaced again.

"Uhh, Ginny? I can't swim." She said. Ginny blinked at her in surprise before shrugging,

"That's okay, I can teach you. And even then the waters not deep, it only comes up to about your waist in most places. So you shouldn't worry to much, if you really don't like it, we'll figure something else out okay?" She asked. Roselyn debated in her head for a few moments before nodding reluctantly,

"Well, it does sound nice." Ginny squealed and pulled out two plain blue one piece swim suits for them to change into.

Roselyn was surprised to find that she actually caught on to swimming relatively quickly and before long she and Ginny were having a lot of fun splashing each other and messing around.

"Well, well, you two look like your having fun! Mind if we join?" Roselyn spun around in surprise to see the twins standing on the shore dressed in swim trunks, and further behind them she could see Ron and Harry headed their way as well. Roselyn smiled and looked to Ginny who was blushing alittle as she stared at Harry but nodded.

"Sure! The more the merrier!" She said. The twins grinned mischievously before jumping in, splashing Ginny and Roselyn who were just laughing.

"We should play chicken!" Fred said when Ron and Harry finally made it over. Roselyn crinkled her nose.

"How do you play?" She asked warily. George grinned excitedly.

"Well, you have a person climb up onto another person's shoulders and they go up against another team like that and whoever manages to wrestle the other team into the water first wins." Roselyn didn't really like the sound of that, but everyone else was really excited about it. Ron was the first to notice her discomfort and said

"How about you watch for the first round Rose, then, if you wanna play, you and your team mate can play the winner." Roselyn nodded, smiling gratefully at him.

"Okay, who makes the teams?" She asked.

"How about Harry and Ron are a team, Fred and Roselyn can be a team and me and Ginny can be a team. That should make the teams mostly even." George said, scruitinizing the teams. Ron looked at him in surprise,

"You mean you and Fred aren't going to be a team?" He asked. George rolled his eyes.

"Not this time, I mean it wouldn't be fair to the girls, you and Harry will make a good team and your strong enough to go against us probably, me and fred are practically unbeatable, but the girls are both still really small and they would be at a disadvantage and this way we all have a fighting chance and Roselyn wont be quite so frightened." He said, practically bragging. The girls both shot disgruntled looks at each other, not liking being called weak, but neither of them protested aloud. Thus began a huge war between everyone, Roselyn was surprised to find that she actually really liked the game and she was surprised but pleased to find that she and Fred made a good team.

The rest of the week flew by quickly, with Ginny and Roselyn occupying themselves with things to do such as drawing or playing in the water, they also spent a lot of time talking about the magical world so that Roselyn knew what was usual or unusual in it.

Roselyn found that she really enjoyed all the strange things that happened in the Burrow.

Harry had got a shock the first time he looked in the mirror over the kitchen mantelpiece and it shouted, "Tuck your shirt in, scruffy!", Roselyn nearly fell down the stairs when she first heard the explosions from Fred and George's room and the ghoul in the attic howled and dropped pipes whenever he felt things were getting too quiet. What Harry and Roselyn found most unusual about life at the Weasleys, however, wasn't the talking mirror or the clanking ghoul: It was the fact that everybody there seemed to like them.

Mrs. Weasley fussed over the state of Harry's socks and tried to force him to eat fourth helpings at every meal.

Mr. Weasley liked Roselyn to sit next to him at the dinner table so that he could bombard her with questions about life with Muggles, asking her to explain how things like plugs and the postal service worked.

"Fascinating," he would say as Roselyn talked him through using a telephone. "Ingenious, really, how many ways Muggles have found of getting along without magic."

To Roselyn and Ginny's excitement, a week after the Potters arrived at the Burrow, they were woken up by some tap's at Ginny's window. Roselyn, who had been closest to the window, groaned and rolled out of bed to let the strange barn owl into the room. The owl flew over to Ginny's desk and stuck it's leg out for her to take the letters. She blinked as she looked down to see two letters, one addressed to her and one to Ginny in bright green letters.

**To Miss Roselyn G. Potter**

**Bedroom on the third landing**

**The Burrow**

She squealed and jumped onto Ginny who groaned.

"umph! Get off Rose. What do you want?" She moaned.

"Our letters came! Our letters came! We're going to Hogwarts! I'm so excited" she let out a breath of air as Ginny knocked her off of her and the bed as she sat up in excitement.

"They came?! Oh, let me see! Let me see!" She said, practically ripping it out of Roselyn's hand when she held it out to her.

"To Miss Ginerva M. Weasley, Bedroom on the third landing, The Burrow!" She squealed looking over to Roselyn. "Let's go show mom and dad." She said. Roselyn nodded in excitement as they both quickly got dressed and ran down to the kitchen.

"Mom! Mom, Dad! Rose and I got our letters." She said when they finally saw them, sitting at the table eating some porriage. Mrs. Weasley smiled at them.

"Congratulations dears. The boy's letters all just arrived as well. Why don't you sit down to eat while we wait for the boys." She said. Roselyn quickly took a seat and started to load her plate, she had quickly grown to adore Mrs. Weasley's cooking. Soon enough, they heard the boys come down and the moment she saw Harry, Ginny accidentally knocked her porridge bowl to the floor with a loud clatter.

To Roselyn's amusement, Ginny seemed very prone to knocking things over whenever Harry entered a room. She dived under the table to retrieve the bowl and emerged with her face glowing like the setting sun. Pretending he hadn't noticed this, Harry sat down and took the toast Mrs. Weasley offered him.

"Letters from school," said Mr. Weasley, passing Harry and Ron identical envelopes of yellowish parchment, addressed in green ink. "Dumbledore already knows you're here— doesn't miss a trick, that man. You two've got them, too," he added, as Fred and George ambled in, still in their pajamas.

Roselyn smiled and looked back down at her letter, remembering her book list that she hadn't looked at yet.

For a few minutes there was silence as they all read their letters. When Roselyn got to her book list her eyebrows rose.

FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS WILL REQUIRE:

Uniform

1. Three sets of plain work robes (black)

2. One plain pointed hat (black) for day wear

3. One pair of protective gloves (dragon hide or similar)

4. One winter cloak (black, silver fastenings)

Please not that all pupils' clothes should carry name tags.

Course Books

All students should have a copy of each of the following:

The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1) by Miranda Goshawk

A History of Magic by Bathilda Bagshot

Magical Theory by Adalbert Waffling

A Beginners' Guide to Transfiguration by Emeric Switch

One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi by Phyllida Spore

Magical Droughts and Potions by Arsenius Jigger

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by Newt Scammander

Break with a Banshee by Gilderoy Lockhart

Gadding with Ghouls by Gilderoy Lockhart

Holidays with Hags by Gilderoy Lockhart

Travels with Trolls by Gilderoy Lockhart

Voyages with Vampires by Gilderoy Lockhart

Wanderings with Werewolves by Gilderoy Lockhart

Year with the Yeti by Gilderoy Lockhart

Other Equipment

1 wand

1 cauldron (pewter, standard size 2)

1 set glass or crystal phials

1 telescope

1 set brass scales

Students may bring an owl OR a cat OR a toad

PARENTS ARE REMINDED THAT FIRST YEARS ARE NOT ALLOWED THEIR OWN BROOMSTICKS

Fred, who had finished his own list, peered over at Harry's.

"You've been told to get all Lockhart's books, too!" he said. "The new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher must be a fan — bet it's a witch."

At this point, Fred caught his mother's eye and quickly busied himself with the marmalade, making Roselyn giggle.

"That lot won't come cheap," said George, with a quick look at his parents. "Lockhart's books are really expensive…"

"Well, we'll manage," said Mrs. Weasley, but she looked worried. "I expect we'll be able to pick up a lot of Ginny's things secondhand." Roselyn looked up, worried

"Harry and I could help some, it's the least we can do for everything you've done for us." Mrs. Weasley smiled kindly

"Oh no dear, that's alright. You two don't have to pay us for anything." Roselyn frowned, but nodded before turning to Harry.

"Harry, can I have you're old books from last year? At least the ones that are the same?" Harry nodded before everyone's attention was diverted when Percy walked in. He was already dressed, his Hogwarts prefect badge pinned to his sweater vest.

"Morning, all," said Percy briskly. "Lovely day."

He sat down in the only remaining chair but leapt up again almost immediately, pulling from underneath him Errol, who was looking a lot like a molting grey feather duster.

"Errol!" said Ron, taking the limp owl from Percy and extracting a letter from under its wing. "Finally— he's got Hermione's answer. I wrote to her saying we were going to try and rescue you from the Dursleys."

He carried Errol to a perch just inside the back door and tried to stand him on it, but Errol flopped straight off again so Ron lay him on the draining board instead, muttering, "Pathetic." Then he ripped open Hermione's letter and read it out loud:

"Dear Ron, and Harry and Roselyn, if you're there,

"I hope everything went all right and that Harry and Roselyn are okay and that you didn't do anything illegal to get them out, Ron, because that would get them into trouble, too. I've been really worried and if Harry is all right, will you please let me know at once, but perhaps it would be better if you used a different owl because I think another delivery might finish your one off.

"I'm very busy with schoolwork, of course'— How can she be?" said Ron in horror. "We're on holiday! —'and we're going to London next Wednesday to buy my new books. Why don't we meet in Diagon Alley? Let me know what's happening as soon as you can.

Love from Hermione."

"Well, that fits in nicely, we can go and get all your things then, too," said Mrs. Weasley, starting to clear the table. "What're you all up to today?"

Roselyn and Ginny decided to grab some parchment and quill, or Art book and pencils in Roselyn's case, and go out to the garden to draw. Roselyn had been teaching Ginny to draw while also trying to improve her own talent.

"So are you excited to get to go to Hogwarts?" Ginny asked after a few moments of silence. Roselyn looked up and smiled in excitement.

"Yeah, I'm really excited." Her smile faltered for a moment, "but I'm worried that I'm not going to get into Gryffindor." She admitted, "I'm not really that brave. And I'm worried that Harry will be upset with me if I don't get in." Ginny smiled at her reassuringly.

"Oh, don't worry, I'm sure you'll do well in whatever house you get in." Ginny paused and tilted her head as she studied Roselyn, "I'm pretty sure if you don't get into Gryffindor you'll be a Ravenclaw, simply because of the amount of books you've read here, and your always really curious about everything. You'd also be a really good Hufflepuff because you're really loyal and you care about everyone and everything. And if you're really worried about Harry, why don't you just ask him what he thinks?"

"Yeah, I think that's what I'll do. Thanks for that Ginny, you're a really good friend. I'm glad I wrote to you last year." Said Roselyn after she thought about it for a moment, nodding her head to Ginny in thanks.

"Me too!" Ginny said, smiling and nodding back before looking down at her paper, "Okay, now, show me how to do eyes again." She said, moving the topic effectively off of the houses.

Mrs. Weasley woke them all early the following Wednesday. After a quick half a dozen bacon sandwiches each, they pulled on their coats and Mrs. Weasley took a flowerpot off the kitchen mantelpiece and peered inside.

"We're running low, Arthur," she sighed. "We'll have to buy some more today… Ah well, guests first! After you, Harry dear!"

And she offered him the flowerpot.

Harry stared at them all watching him and Roselyn looked confused only for a minute before remembering what Ginny had told her about different modes of transportation that witches and wizards used.

"W-what am I supposed to do?" he stammered.

"He's never traveled by Floo powder," said Ron suddenly. "Sorry, Harry, I forgot."

"Never?" said Mr. Weasley. "But how did you get to Diagon Alley to buy your school things last year?"

"I went on the Underground —"

"Really?" said Mr. Weasley eagerly. "Were there escapators? How exactly —"

"Not now, Arthur," said Mrs. Weasley. "Floo powder's a lot quicker, dear, but goodness me, if you've never used it before —"

"He'll be all right, Mum," said Fred. "Harry, Roselyn, watch us first."

He took a pinch of glittering powder out of the flowerpot, stepped up to the fire, and threw the powder into the flames.

With a roar, the fire turned emerald green and rose higher than Fred, who stepped right into it, shouted, "Diagon Alley!" and vanished.

"You must speak clearly, dear," Mrs. Weasley told the Potters as George dipped his hand into the flowerpot. "And be sure to get out at the right grate…"

"The right what?" said Harry nervously as the fire roared and whipped George out of sight, too.

"Well, there are an awful lot of wizard fires to choose from, you know, but as long as you've spoken clearly-"

"He'll be fine, Molly, don't fuss," said Mr. Weasley, helping himself to Floo powder too.

"But, dear, if one of them got lost, how would we ever explain to their aunt and uncle?"

"They wouldn't mind," Harry reassured her. "Dudley would think it was a brilliant joke if we got lost up a chimney, don't worry about that —"

"Well… all right… Harry, you go after Arthur," said Mrs. Weasley. "Now, when you get into the fire, say where you're going."

"And keep your elbows tucked in," Ron advised.

"And your eyes shut," said Mrs. Weasley. "The soot —"

"Don't fidget," said Ron. "Or you might well fall out of the wrong fireplace —"

"But don't panic and get out too early; wait until you see Fred and George."

"Be careful Harry," Roselyn chirped from beside Ginny.

It was obvious that Harry was still confused as he took a pinch of Floo powder and walked to the edge of the fire. He took a deep breath, scattered the powder into the flames, and stepped forward, he opened his mouth and coughed out a quick, "D-Dia-gon Alley,".

As the flames engulfed him Mrs. Weasley stepped forward and looked hesitantly from the flame to the last of the group.

"Oh dear, Oh my. That wasn't very clear at all was it?" She asked. Mr. Weasley was the one who smiled reassuringly at them

"Don't worry dear, I'm sure he probably only went one grate too far. We'll find him." He then stepped forward and grabbed some floo powder

"I'll go check alright?" he didn't give any of them a chance to answer as he was off. Roselyn looked uncertainly at the fireplace before turning to Ginny.

"Can we go together Ginny? I don't think I want to do this alone the first time." Ginny and Mrs. Weasley nodded

"That's a good idea, go now, before me." The two girls clasped hands and stepped into the grate and Ginny took some powder and called

"Diagon Ally!" and the green flame engulfed them. It felt as though they were being sucked down a giant drain. They seemed to be spinning very fast — the roaring in her ears was deafening — she immediately closed her eyes to stop feeling dizzy—her bacon sandwiches were churning inside her — she wished it would stop, and then…

The girls fell out of the fire place, Roselyn falling over which resulted in Ginny falling on top of her.

"Bit unbalanced there mate?" Fred asked as he helped them to their feet. Roselyn immediately looked around.

"Where's Harry?" Fred frowned as he shrugged.

"Dunno, he never came through. Dad went to go look for him though, don't you worry." But Roselyn did worry. Mrs. Weasley came through she led them through the streets as they looked in store windows for Harry. After about ten minutes though they saw Hagrid, who just so happened to be standing with Harry, Hermione, the rest of the Weasley's and two other adults that looked like they might have been Hermione's parents.

Roselyn sprinted ahead of Mrs. Weasley and Ginny,

"Harry!" she shrieked, pulling him into a hug.

"Oh, Harry — oh, my dear — you could have been anywhere —" Gasping for breath Mrs. Weasley pulled a large clothes brush out of her bag and began sweeping off the soot Hagrid hadn't managed to beat away. Mr. Weasley took Harry's broken glasses that he was wearing, gave them a tap of his wand, and returned them, good as new.

"Good to see ya again lit'le Rosie. Well, gotta be off," said Hagrid, who was having his hand wrung by Mrs. Weasley ("Knockturn Alley! If you hadn't found him, Hagrid!"). "See yer at Hogwarts!" And he strode away, head and shoulders taller than anyone else in the packed street.

"Guess who I saw in Borgin and Burkes?" Harry asked Ron and Hermione as they climbed the Gringotts steps. "Malfoy and his father."

"Did Lucius Malfoy buy anything?" said Mr. Weasley sharply behind them.

"No, he was selling —"

"So he's worried," said Mr. Weasley with grim satisfaction. "Oh, I'd love to get Lucius Malfoy for something…"

"You be careful, Arthur," said Mrs. Weasley sharply as they were bowed into the bank by a goblin at the door. "That family's trouble. Don't go biting off more than you can chew —"

"So you don't think I'm a match for Lucius Malfoy?" said Mr. Weasley indignantly, but he was distracted almost at once by the sight of Hermione's parents, who were standing nervously at the counter that ran all along the great marble hall, waiting for Hermione to introduce them.

"But you're Muggles!" said Mr. Weasley delightedly. "We must have a drink! What's that you've got there? Oh, you're changing Muggle money. Molly, look!" He pointed excitedly at the ten-pound notes in Mr. Granger's hand.

"Meet you back here," Ron said to Hermione as the Weasleys and the Potters were led off to their underground vaults by another Gringotts goblin.

The vaults were reached by means of small, goblin-driven carts that sped along miniature train tracks through the bank's underground tunnels. Roselyn, who hated the carts, was extremely glad she had kept her eyes closed so she didn't see the Weasleys' very small pile of silver Sickles inside, and just one gold Galleon.

Mrs. Weasley felt right into the corners before sweeping the whole lot into her bag. When they got to their vault Roselyn gasped as Harry tried to block the contents from view as he hastily shoved handfuls of coins into a leather bag. After he grabbed some Roselyn hastily shoved some coins into her own bag.

Back outside on the marble steps, they all separated. Percy muttered vaguely about needing a new quill. Fred and George had spotted their friend from Hogwarts, Lee Jordan. Mrs. Weasley, Ginny, and Roselyn were going to get the girls' things for their first year. Mr. Weasley was insisting on taking the Grangers off to the Leaky Cauldron for a drink. And Harry and his friends took off to find their own school things.

"We'll all meet at Flourish and Blotts in an hour to buy your schoolbooks," said Mrs. Weasley, setting off with Ginny and Roselyn. "And not one step down Knockturn Alley!" she shouted at the twins' retreating backs.

Roselyn was super excited as they got fitted for their robes, when she stood up to get fitted, another small girl, about her and Ginny's age with long dark hair and dark grey eyes walked in, turning to wave at her parents who waved back before wandering away before turning to look at the other two.

"Hello there dearie, Hogwarts as well?" Madam Malkin asked. The girl turned and nodded. "Very well, just wait one moment while I get these two all finished up." She said before turning to finish pinning Roselyns robes to the proper length.

"Hello, I'm Astoria Greengrass, pleased to meet you." She said softly. Ginny and Roselyn smiled at her.

"Hello, I'm Ginny Weasley and this is Roselyn Potter." Ginny said.

"I prefer Rose, but never Rosie." Roselyn said quickly. The girl looked at her curiously for a moment before smiling.

"Are you both first years too?" She asked. They both nodded and smiled back at her.

"Where did you're parents go?" Mrs. Weasley asked her in concern. Astoria blinked and looked back out the window before shrugging.

"I don't know, they were going to let me get my robes on my own then come and pick me up in a little. They didn't want to just stand around crowding the shop." She explained. Unfortunately Madam Malkin patted Roselyn and said,

"You're all set dears, let me ring you up." Roselyn and Mrs. Weasley paid for their things before the girls all turned to each other.

"I'll see you on the train then." Astoria said, looking slightly put out that they were leaving. Ginny nodded.

"Sure! We'll look for you." She said before they left the shop to buy their wands. Olivander, just as he had the previous year, freaked her out, but Roselyn was very glad to get her wand which was Maple and Unicorn hair, 12 ¼", surprisingly swishy. Roselyn had managed to convince Mrs. Weasley to let her buy Ginny's wand as an early Birthday present because 'I won't get another chance!' But what Roselyn really liked was Eeylopes Owl Emporium.

At Eeylopes is where she got her Midnight black owl that had a white crescent moon shape on her forehead and Roselyn took absolutely no time naming her Artemis, after the goddess of the night and the hunt.

An hour later, they headed for Flourish and Blotts. They were by no means the only ones making their way to the bookshop. As they approached it, they saw to their surprise a large crowd jostling outside the doors, trying to get in. The reason for this was proclaimed by a large banner stretched across the upper windows:

GILDEROY LOCKHART will be signing copies of his autobiography

MAGICAL ME

Today 12:30 - 4:30 P.M.

"We can actually meet him!" Mrs. Weasley exclaimed excitedly

The crowd seemed to be made up mostly of witches around Mrs. Weasley's age. A harassed-looking wizard stood at the door, saying, "Calmly, please, ladies… Don't push, there… mind the books, now…"

In the store they found Mr. and Mrs. Granger already standing in line for a signature and joined them. Mrs. Weasley turned to the girls

"Now, we'll get our books signed then go find your other books. Keep an eye out for your brothers."

Shortly after that Harry, Ron and Hermione managed to squeeze through the crowd to them.

"Oh, there you are, good," said Mrs. Weasley. She sounded breathless and kept patting her hair. "We'll be able to see him in a minute…"

Gilderoy Lockhart came slowly into view, seated at a table surrounded by large pictures of his own face, all winking and flashing dazzlingly white teeth at the crowd. The real Lockhart was wearing robes of forget-me-not blue that exactly matched his eyes; his pointed wizard's hat was set at a jaunty angle on his wavy hair. A short, irritable-looking man was dancing around taking photographs with a large black camera that emitted puffs of purple smoke with every blinding flash.

"Out of the way, there," he snarled at Ron, moving back to get a better shot. "This is for the Daily Prophet —"

"Big deal," said Ron, rubbing his foot where the photographer had stepped on it. Roselyn snorted in amusement, she really did feel bad for Ron.

Gilderoy Lockhart heard him and looked up. He saw Ron — and then he saw Harry. He stared. Then he leapt to his feet and positively shouted, "It can't be Harry Potter?"

The crowd parted, whispering excitedly; Lockhart dived forward, seized Harry's arm, who in turn grabbed his sister's arm, and pulled them to the front.

"And little Roselyn too!" Lockhart crooned. Roselyn groaned in annoyance as she tried to get away, but was unable to because of the grip Harry had on her.

The crowd burst into applause. Roselyn could practically feel her face light on fire as Lockhart shook Harry's hand, then her's, for the photographer, who was clicking away madly, wafting thick smoke over the Weasleys.

"Nice big smile, Harry, Roselyn" said Lockhart, through his own gleaming teeth. "Together, the three of us are worth the front page."

When he finally let go of Harry's hand, the two tried to sidle back over to the Weasleys, but Lockhart threw an arm around Harry's shoulders and clamped him tightly to his side. Harry didn't let go of Roselyn either, who was wishing she could just sink into the ground about now.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he said loudly, waving for quiet. "What an extraordinary moment this is! The perfect moment for me to make a little announcement I've been sitting on for some time!

"When the young Potter siblings here stepped into Flourish and Blotts today, they only wanted to buy my autobiography — which I shall be happy to present them both now, free of charge —" The crowd applauded again.

"They had no idea," Lockhart continued, giving Harry a little shake that made his glasses slip to the end of his nose and jostling Roselyn, "that they would shortly be getting much, much more than my book, Magical Me. Them and their schoolmates will, in fact, be getting the real magical me. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I have great pleasure and pride in announcing that this September; I will be taking up the post of Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry!"

The crowd cheered and clapped and the Potters both found themselves being presented with the entire works of Gilderoy Lockhart. Staggering slightly under their weight, Harry and Roselyn managed to make their way out of the limelight to the edge of the room, where Ginny was standing next to her new cauldron.

"You have these," Harry mumbled to her, tipping the books into the cauldron. "I'll buy my own —"

"Bet you loved that, didn't you, Potter?" said a voice that Roselyn couldn't place. When she turned around, she saw a pale faced boy with extreamly blonde hair wearing a sneer.

"Famous Harry Potter and his little sister," He said. "Can't even go into a bookshop without making the front page."

"Leave him alone, he didn't want all that!" said Ginny. It was the first time she had spoken in front of Harry. She and Roselyn were glaring at him.

"Potter, you've got yourself a girlfriend!" drawled the boy. Ginny went scarlet as Ron and Hermione fought their way over, both clutching stacks of Lockhart's books.

"Oh, it's you," said Ron, looking at him as if he were something unpleasant on the sole of his shoe. "Bet you're surprised to see Harry here, eh Malfoy?" Roselyn blinked in surprise before looking him over closely, 'so this was the boy Harry said was worse than Dudley.' She thought.

"Not as surprised as I am to see you in a shop, Weasley," retorted Malfoy. "I suppose your parents will go hungry for a month to pay for all those."

"What is your problem?" Roselyn exclaimed, appalled by his rudeness. Ron went as red as Ginny. He dropped his books into the cauldron, too, and started toward Malfoy, but Harry and Hermione grabbed the back of his jacket.

"Ron!" said Mr. Weasley, struggling over with Fred and George. "What are you doing? It's too crowded in here, let's go outside."

"Well, well, well — Arthur Weasley."

It was Mr. Malfoy. He stood with his hand on Draco's shoulder, sneering in just the same way.

"Lucius," said Mr. Weasley, nodding coldly.

"Busy time at the Ministry, I hear," said Mr. Malfoy. "All those raids… I hope they're paying you overtime?"

He reached into Ginny's cauldron and extracted, from amid the glossy Lockhart books, a very old, very battered copy of A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration.

"Obviously not," Mr. Malfoy said. "Dear me, what's the use of being a disgrace to the name of wizard if they don't even pay you well for it?"

Mr. Weasley flushed darker than either Ron or Ginny.

"We have a very different idea of what disgraces the name of wizard, Malfoy," he said.

"Clearly," said Mr. Malfoy, his pale eyes straying to Mr. and Mrs. Granger, who were watching apprehensively. "The company you keep, Weasley… and I thought your family could sink no lower."

There was a thud of metal as Ginny's cauldron went flying; Mr. Weasley had thrown himself at Mr. Malfoy, knocking him backward into a bookshelf. Roselyn gave a startled shriek as she was pushed backwards and she would have hit the ground had the twins not caught her.

Dozens of heavy spellbooks came thundering down on all their heads; there was a yell of, "Get him, Dad!" from Fred or George;

Mrs. Weasley was shrieking, "No, Arthur, no!"; the crowd stampeded backward, knocking more shelves over; "Gentlemen, please — please!" cried the assistant, and then, louder than all —

"Break it up, there, gents, break it up —"

Hagrid was wading toward them through the sea of books. In an instant he had pulled Mr. Weasley and Mr. Malfoy apart. Mr. Weasley had a cut lip and Mr. Malfoy had been hit in the eye by an Encyclopedia of Toadstools. He was still holding Ginny's old Transfiguration book. He thrust it at her, his eyes glittering with malice.

"Here, girl — take your book — it's the best your father can give you —" Pulling himself out of Hagrid's grip he beckoned to Draco and swept from the shop.

"Yeh should've ignored him, Arthur," said Hagrid, almost lifting Mr. Weasley off his feet as he straightened his robes. "Rotten ter the core, the whole family, everyone knows that — no Malfoy's worth listenin' ter — bad blood, that's what it is — come on now — let's get outta here."

The assistant looked as though he wanted to stop them leaving, but he barely came up to Hagrid's waist and seemed to think better of it. They hurried up the street, the Grangers shaking with fright and Mrs. Weasley beside herself with fury.

"A fine example to set for your children… brawling in public… what Gilderoy Lockhart must've thought -"

"He was pleased," said Fred. "Didn't you hear him as we were leaving? He was asking that bloke from the Daily Prophet if he'd be able to work the fight into his report — said it was all publicity —"

But it was a subdued group that headed back to the fireside in the Leaky Cauldron, where Harry, Roselyn, the Weasleys, and all their shopping would be traveling back to the Burrow using Floo powder. They said good-bye to the Grangers, who were leaving the pub for the Muggle Street on the other side; Mr. Weasley started to ask them how bus stops worked, but stopped quickly at the look on Mrs. Weasley's face.

Roselyn, this time choosing to try to floo alone, closed her eyes tightly and hoped she didn't get lost, and decided that she really, really hated floo travel.


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, Just Roselyn and everyone you don't recognize.**

**AN: Thank you to my reviewers who pointed out that I had mistakenly posted up the wrong third chapter of my story. I have fixed that and am now moving on. Please continue to Review.**

Chapter 5: The Whomping Willow

Even though Roselyn was extremely excited to get to go to Hogwarts, she knew that she would miss the Burrow. It was so hard not to look at this family and not be jealous, especially when her and Harry had only the Dursley's to look forward to at the end of the year.

It was defiantly difficult not to feel jealous of Ginny when she thought of the Dursleys and the sort of welcome they could expect next time they turned up on Privet Drive.

On their last evening, Mrs. Weasley conjured up a sumptuous dinner that included all of Harry and Roselyn's favorite things, ending with a mouth-watering treacle pudding. Fred and George rounded off the evening with a display of Filibusters Fireworks; they filled the kitchen with red and blue stars that bounced from ceiling to wall for at least half an hour. Then it was time for a last mug of hot chocolate and bed.

Just before bed, Roselyn got the courage to talk to Harry.

"Harry? Can we talk for a moment? Alone." Roselyn asked before Harry was able to go upstairs with Ron. Harry looked at her quizzically, but nodded and told Ron he'd meet him in a moment before walking over to sit next to her on the couch.

"What's wrong Rose?" Roselyn wrung her hands nervously,

"What if…. What if I'm not in Gryffindor?" she asked softly. Harry blinked in surprised before smiling and hugging her

"Oh, well, don't worry about that okay? I won't be mad if you don't get in." Roselyn sniffed and hugged him back

"You'll love me even if I get into Slythrin? Or make a Slythrin friend?" Harry hesitated only for a moment before nodding decidedly.

"Of course I will. But, just so you know, I don't think you will be sorted there. I think your more of a Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw. And just be careful if you do befriend a Slythrin, after all, it's not a very nice house." Roselyn smiled and nodded

"Alright then. Thank you Harry. I love you." Harry nodded and gave her a hug before helping her up.

"Love you too Rosie. Now let's go to sleep." Roselyn nodded and followed Harry upstairs, parting ways when they got to the third landing.

It took a long while to get started next morning. They were up at dawn, but somehow they still seemed to have a great deal to do. Mrs. Weasley dashed about in a bad mood looking for spare socks and quills; people kept colliding on the stairs, half dressed and bits of toast in their hands; and Mr. Weasley nearly broke his neck, tripping over a stray chicken as he crossed the yard carrying Ginny's trunk to the car.

Harry and Roselyn couldn't see how nine people, seven large trunks, three owls, and a rat were going to fit into one small Ford Anglia. Roselyn had forgotten of the special features that Mr. Weasley had added.

"Not a word to Molly," he whispered to them as he opened the trunk and showed him how it had been magically expanded so that the luggage fitted easily.

When at last they were all in the car, Mrs. Weasley glanced into the backseat, where Harry, Ron, Fred, George, and Percy were all sitting comfortably side by side, and said, "Muggles do know more than we give them credit for, don't they?" She, Roselyn, and Ginny got into the front seat, which had been stretched so that it resembled a park bench. "I mean, you'd never know it was this roomy from outside, would you?"

Mr. Weasley started up the engine and they trundled out of the yard, Harry and Roselyn turning back for a last look at the house. They barely had time to wonder when they'd see it again when they were back — George had forgotten his box of Filibuster fireworks. Five minutes after that, they skidded to a halt in the yard so that Fred could run in for his broomstick. They had almost reached the highway when Ginny shrieked that she'd left her diary.

By the time she had clambered back into the car, they were running very late, and tempers were running high.

Mr. Weasley glanced at his watch and then at his wife.

"Molly, dear —"

"No, Arthur —"

"No one would see — this little button here is an Invisibility Booster installed — that'd get us up in the air — then we fly above the clouds. We'd be there in ten minutes and no one would be any the wiser —"

"I said no, Arthur, not in broad daylight —" They reached King's Cross at a quarter to eleven.

Mr. Weasley dashed across the road to get trolleys for their trunks and they all hurried into the station . Rosleyn was slightly nervous to go through the wall of platform 9 ¾ . She was pretty sure that it could seriously hurt if she ran into it.

"Percy first," said Mrs. Weasley, looking nervously at the clock overhead, which showed they had only five minutes to disappear casually through the barrier.

Percy strode briskly forward and vanished. Mr. Weasley went next; Fred and George followed.

"I'll take Ginny and Roselyn and you two come right after us," Mrs. Weasley told Harry and Ron, grabbing Ginny's hand while Ginny grabbed Roselyn hand and setting off. In the blink of an eye they were gone.

Roselyn nearly stopped and gaped around the platform. Families were rushing around last minute as children were quickly finding places to sit.

"Hurry, Hurry!" Mrs. Weasley said as they loaded up their trunks. "Now, have a good year and stay out of trouble!" she said giving Ginny and Roselyn a quick hug.

"Bye! Thank you for this summer!" Roselyn called as the train started to pull out. Roselyn looked to Ginny and shrugged,

"Well, lets go find somewhere to sit alright?" Ginny smiled and nodded before looking thoughtful

"I wonder where Ron and Harry are?" Roselyn smiled knowingly at her before shrugging.  
"They probably got on somewhere else. But lets not sit with them. I want to actually talk with you." She teased as Ginny's face went a brilliant scarlet color

"Oh be quiet." They took off down the train, looking into compartments that were full of children. Finally, about half way down the train, they found a compartment that only had one small, mousey-haired boy sitting in it looking out the window excitedly. The two girls looked at each other, shrugged, and opened the compartment

"Hello, mind if we sit here? Everywhere else is full." Ginny said. The boy looked over and smiled excitedly

"Yeah! Of course! I'm Collin Creevy, nice to meet you! Who are you? Are you first years too? I am." Roselyn looked at him strangely as she sat down next to him, Ginny sitting down across from them.

"Nice to meet you too. Yes, we're first years also and this is Ginny Weasley and I'm Roselyn Potter." The boys jaw dropped and looked at her in Awww. Roselyn gave Ginny a confused and slightly uncomfortable glance before looking back at Collin.

"Woooowww! Are you related to Harry Potter by chance?" Roselyn nodded slowly

"Yes, I'm his little sister." Collins eyes widened

"Oh wow! I know all about your brother! How he survived when You-know-who tried to kill him and only got a scar on his forehead! That's so amazing! And he was only a baby!" Roselyn nodded and was only able to get in

"Actually he was a toddler." Before Ginny jumped in

"Yeah, and he faced you-know-who last year and lived too! And got threw all sorts of enchantments and everything!" Roselyn sat back, feeling a little more than uncomfortable. She loved her brother and thought he was really cool. But this hero worship was strange to her. After all, until last year there was nothing special about either of them. Colin turned to Roselyn suddenly and asked

"So how did you survive the attack?" Ginny looked over to her with a curious gaze as well. Roselyn shifted

"Oh, well, Voldemort tried to kill Harry first so he never got a chance to try and kill me." Roselyn explained what Harry had explained to her that summer when he had first gotten home. Ginny seemed to be able to sense that Roselyn did not like the conversation and changed it to what house Colin thought he would be in.

"Anything off the trolley dears?" they all looked up in surprise before looking at each other. Roselyn could see that neither had money so she hopped up

"Lets see, lets get a little of everything." The trolley lady smiled and gave her the sweets as she paid. Her. Roselyn came back into the compartment and tipped all the candy onto the seat next to Ginny.

"So, are you two going to help me eat all this?" they smiled and grabbed some candy.

"Oh, uhh, these aren't real frogs are they?" Colin asked as he eyed the chocolate frog. Ginny and Roselyn laughed, (even though Roselyn had the same question when she had her first one at Christmas the previous year)

"No, they're just magicked." Ginny explained as she sucked on a sugar quill. When Roselyn went to grab a box of bertie botts every flavored beans to try, something blue just out the window caught her attention. Her head whipped over as she stood up suddenly, startling the other two.

"What? What is it Rose?" Ginny asked. Roselyn pressed her head to the window.

"No way! I think Ron and Harry are flying the car!" she said. Ginny's eyes widened and looked out the window just in time for the car to dip down from the clouds for a few moments before flying back up. The three looked at each other in astonishment

"That was a flying car!" Colin stated. Roselyn nodded staring at where the car had just disappeared in confusion.

"I wonder why they're not on the train?" she mused out loud, before turning back to her candy. 'I hope they're okay.' She thought briefly before going back to talking with the other two. Soon the train started to slow down before stopping completely and everyone started to get off.

"Firs' years! Firs' years over here!" they heard. Roselyn turned around and smiled.

"Hagrid!" she called waving to the giant man. He smiled

"All righ' there lit'le Rosie?" Roselyn nodded as Collin looked up at aww at him.

Slipping and stumbling, they followed Hagrid down what seemed to be a steep, narrow path. It was so dark on either side of them that Roselyn thought there must be thick trees there.

Nobody spoke much as they walked on.

"Yeh'll get yer firs' sight o' Hogwarts in a sec," Hagrid called over his shoulder, "jus' round this bend here."

There was a loud "Oooooh!"

The narrow path had opened suddenly onto the edge of a great black lake Perched atop a high mountain on the other side, its windows sparkling in the starry sky, was a vast castle with many turrets and towers.

"No more'n four to a boat!" Hagrid called, pointing to a fleet of little boats sitting in the water by the shore. Roselyn, Collin, and Ginny were joined by a dark haired, grey eyed girl that Roselyn finally recognized selveral minutes later as Astoria Greengrass.

"Everyone in?" shouted Hagrid, who had a boat to himself. "Right then - FORWARD!"

And the fleet of little boats moved off all at once, gliding across the lake, which was a smooth as glass. Everyone was silent, staring up at the great castle overhead. It towered over them as they sailed nearer and nearer to the cliff on which it stood.

"Heads down!" yelled Hagrid as the first boats reached the cliff; they all bent their heads and the little boats carried them through a curtain of ivy that hid a wide opening in the cliff face. They were carried along a dark tunnel, which seemed to be taking them right underneath the castle, until they reached a kind of underground harbor, where they clambered out onto rocks and pebbles.

When they got out, Hagrid walked to the door, raised a giant fist, and knocked.

The door swung open at once. A tall, black-haired witch in emerald-green robes stood there. She had a very stern face and Roselyn was immediately able to tell that this was Professor McGonagall, just from Harry's description of her.

"The firs' years, Professor McGonagall," said Hagrid.

"Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here," She pulled the door wide. The entrance hall was so big you could have fit the whole of the Dursleys' house in it.

The stone walls were lit with flaming torches like the ones at Gringotts, the ceiling was too high to make it out, and a magnificent marble staircase facing them led to the upper floors.

They followed Professor McGonagall across the flagged stone floor. Roselyn could hear the drone of hundreds of voices from a doorway to the right - the rest of the school must already be here - but Professor McGonagall showed the first years into a small, empty chamber off the hall. The crowded in, standing rather closer together than they usually would have done, peering about nervously.

"Welcome to Hogwarts," said Professor McGonagall. "The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your Houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your House will be something like your family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your House, sleep in your House dormitory, and spend free time in your House common room. The four Houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. Each House has its own noble history and each has produced outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn your House points, while any rule breaking will lose House points. At the end of the year, the House with the most points is awarded the House Cup, a great honor. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever House becomes yours. The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school. I suggest you all smarted yourselves up as much as you can while you are waiting."

"I shall return when we are ready for you," said Professor McGonagall. "Please wait quietly."

She left the chamber. Roselyn shifted nervously, undoing her braided hair and redoing it quickly.

"How exactly do they sort us into Houses?" she asked no one in particular. Astoria was the one to answer.

"You have to put on the sorting hat. My sister told me. You put it on and it see's your quality's, then it sorts you." Roselyn looked over at her with a relieved smile

"Oh good. I was afraid it would be a test." Ginny snorted

"Yah, well you'd pass seeing as how you've all but memorized all our books as well as our brothers books." Roselyn blushed, it was true, she had spent a good majority of the summer reading her's and Harrys books so she was all caught up, even though Ginny had laughed at her and told her not to worry about it.

Roselyn kept her eyes fixed on the door. Any second now, Professor McGonagall would come back and she would know what house she would be in.

Then something happened that made her jump about a foot in the air - several people behind her screamed.

"What the -?"

She gasped. So did the people around her. About twenty ghosts had just streamed through the back wall. Pearly-white and slightly transparent, they glided across the room talking to one another and hardly glancing at the first years.

They seemed to be arguing. Roselyn smiled, Harry had also told her about how the ghosts had scared them all at the beginning of the year and their argument. She wondered if they did this on purpose every year.

"Forgive and forget, I say, we ought to give him a second chance -"

"My dear Friar, haven't we given Peeves all the chances he deserves? He gives us all bad names and you know, he's not really even a ghost - I say, what are you doing here?" A ghost wearing a ruff and tights had suddenly noticed the first years.

Nobody answered.

"New students!" said the Fat Friar, smiling around at them. "About to be Sorted, I suppose?"

A few people nodded mutely.

"Hope to see you in Hufflepuff!" said the Friar. "My old House, you know."

"Move along now," said a sharp voice. "The Sorting Ceremony's about to start."

Professor McGonagall had returned, One by one, the ghosts floated away through the opposite wall.

"Now, form a line," Professor McGonagall told the first years, "and follow me."

Feeling oddly as though her legs has turned to lead, Roselyn got into line behind a Astoria, with Ginny behind her, and they walked out of the chamber, back across the hall, and through a pair of double doors into the Great Hall.

Roselyn had never imagined such a strange and splendid place, even with how Harry described it. It was lit by thousands and thousands of candles that were floating in midair over four long tables, where the rest of the students were sitting. These tables were laid with glittering golden plates and goblets. At the top of the hall was another long table where the teachers were sitting. Professor McGonagall led the first years up here, so that they came to a halt in a line facing the other students, with the teachers behind them.

The hundreds of faces staring at the looked like pale lanterns in the flickering candlelight. Dotted here and there among the students, the ghosts shone misty silver. Mainly to avoid all the staring eyes, Roselyn looked upward and saw a velvety black ceiling dotted with stars. It was hard to believe there was a ceiling there at all, and that the Great Hall didn't simply open on to the heavens, though Roselyn knew that it was bewitched.

She quickly looked down again as Professor McGonagall silently placed a four-legged stool in front of the first years. On top of the stool she put a pointed wizards hat. The hat was patched and frayed and extremely dirty.

Roselyn was relieved to see that Astoria hadn't been lying. The sorting hat suddenly opened its mouth and begin to sing, telling about the houses. Roselyn only paid partial attention as she looked around the great hall. She could see the older Weasley brothers all sitting at what must have been Gryffindor table and she recognized Draco Malfoy at the Slythrin table. She tried to spot Harry but couldn't. She looked back up to McGonagall when she cleared her throat.

Professor McGonagall now stepped forward holding a long roll of parchment.

"When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted," she said.

"Collin Creevy" Roselyn had to try not to laugh as the boy all but ran up to the stool and rammed the hat on his head. It wasn't there for long when the hat yelled

"Gryffindor!" a few names later and McGonagall called

"Astoria Greengrass." The dark haired girl hesitated for a moment and Roselyn leaned forward and whispered 'good luck.' To her. The girl turned and gave her a shaky smile before walking up to the hat with a forced calm look. Again the hat took only a few moments before calling

"Slythrin!" Roselyn's heart sank. The girl seemed nice and she had hoped that they could be friends. Roselyn frowned before smiling, well; there was no reason why she couldn't still be the girls friend. Maybe she would be one of the good Slythrins.

"Luna Lovegood." Was called and a girl with Silvery blond hair and big blue eyes wandered up dreamily looking like she had appeared there by accident. The hat barely touched her head when it shouted

"Ravenclaw" As more names were called and the group got smaller, Roselyn grew more nervous. Soon though she heard her name called

"Roselyn Potter" the Hall got quiet and Roselyn thought she had heard several comments about her being Harrys little sister or the sister of the boy who lived; much to her annoyance. she got up to the stool and sat down carefully on it and watched as the hall disappeared from her sight as the hat slipped over her eyes

'Well, what an interesting mind.' The hat thought to her, making her jump a little. 'Quite similar and yet so different from your brother. You've an intelligent mind, oh yes you crave knowledge. You're loyal and hardworking with a thirst to shine apart from your brother but not very courageous yet. Hmmm where to put you?' Roselyn closed her eyes and took a deep breath, not arguing or pleading for one house or another but trying to think of the benefits of all houses. 'hmmm, and mostly unbiased. Weighing options before deciding. I know where to put you.'

"Ravenclaw!" Roselyn opened her eyes and breathed a sigh as McGonagall lifted the hat off her and she walked shakily over to the Ravenclaw house to sit next to Luna Lovegood who she smiled at briefly before looking back to watch as Ginny get sorted into Gryffindor. The girls smiled sadly at each other from across the Hall.

Albus Dumbledore stood up and smiled at them, his eyes twinkling merrily.

"Welcome back to another wonderful year. Before I bore you all to sleep with talks of rules I'll let you dig in! Enjoy!"

Roselyn eyes nearly popped out of their sockets when the plates were suddenly full of food.

"Wow!" she said in amazement.

"It is rather amazing isn't it?" Luna asked in a dreamy voice. Roselyn blinked and looked over to her

"Yes it is. I'm Roselyn, by the way, Roselyn Potter. You can call me Rose though, but never Rosie. Nice to meet you." Luna smiled

"I know, I'm Luna Lovegood." Roselyn smiled and started to stack her plate of food. Choosing to listen to the conversation's around her. To her left, the older students were talking about how their summers went or wondering what lessons were going to be like this year. To her right, all the other first years were getting to know each other.

Soon enough, plates had been cleared away and everyone was feeling full and tired. That's when Dumbledore stood up

"Ahem - just a few more words now that we are all fed and watered. I have a few start of term notices to give you. First years should note that the forest on the grounds is forbidden to all pupils. And a few of our older students would do well to remember that as well."

Dumbledore's twinkling eyes flashed in the direction of the Weasley twins.

"I have also been asked by Mr. Filch, the caretaker, to remind you all that no magic should be used between classes in the corridors. Quiddith trials will be held in the second week of the term. Anyone interested in playing for their House team should contact Madam Hooch.

Also, we have a new Defense Professor, everyone give a warm welcome to Professor Lockheart." To Roselyn's disgust, Lockheart was heavily cheered, by mostly the females in the hall. Just because of what he had done to her and Harry that summer had made her hate the man.

"Now, best be off to bed, off you go!"

"He is a rather strange fellow isn't he?" Luna asked, getting dirty looks from some of the other girls around them, but Roselyn smiled and nodded.

The Ravenclaw first years followed a prefect girl named Penelope Clearwater through the crowds and up the stair case's to a tower that was empty save for a large Eagle head knocker. Penelope turned to face the group.

"Now, this is the entrance to Ravenclaw tower. After you knock, the eagle head will give you a riddle to solve. If you can't get it then you'll have to wait for another student to come by. After each correct answer the riddle will change." With that, Penelope turned and knocked once. The groups surprise the Eagle head all but came to life and asked

"What is the beginning of eternity, the end of time and the beginning of every ending" Penelope thought for a moment before smiling.

"The letter E."

"Well said." The eagle said before the wall opened up, leading the group into the common room which had comfortable looking couches and chairs several bookshelves and a statue of Rowena Ravenclaw. Penelope led them over to the stair cases

"Girls are up the stairs and to your right, boys, the same on your left. If you have any problems or just need to talk you're more than welcome to come to me or any of the other prefects around the tower. Now you best be off to bed because you start classes tomorrow. Goodnight." Roselyn followed the other four girls up the stairs and into their door. Roselyn was grateful to see that her stuff was already at the foot of one of the beds, but she didn't bother getting undressed and just fell into her bed, asleep almost before her head hit the pillow.


	6. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, I do own Rose.**

**Please Read and Review!**

Chapter 6: Gilderoy Lockhart,"

The next morning Roselyn woke up at sunrise. She looked around the room she now shared with four other girls, girls that she would be living with for all but about three months a year for the next seven years. She smiled and hopped up, trying to keep quiet so as to not wake the others, and started to get ready for the day. Just as she finished braiding her red hair into two braids down either side of her head, Luna woke up. She looked around dreamily before smiling at Roselyn,

"Good morning." She hopped up off the bed and started getting ready for the day as well, Roselyn watched for a moment before Luna stated, "Want me to go down to breakfast with you?" Roselyn was taken aback, she had been considering asking that, but wasn't sure if the other girl would want to.

"Yes please. Umm, would you like me to do your hair?" she asked as she saw the other girls fly-away hair. Luna just smiled

"Oh, no thank you, but it was a nice offer." Roselyn nodded but smiled anyways and followed her out. But before they left she glanced at the other girls

"Should we wake them up?" Luna glanced at them as well

"No, it seems that they have alarms set. They'll wake up soon." Roselyn nodded and the two girls left. Roselyn was grateful that she was with Luna because the other girl seemed to have already memorized the way to the Great Hall. To her, everything looked similar and she was already lost, but they had managed to make it down to the Great Hall in good time. They had just started to eat when Harry, Ron, and Hermione came in. Roselyn glanced at Luna.

"I'll be right back. I need to talk to my brother real quick." Luna nodded and smiled. Roselyn got up quickly and walked over to her brother.

"Harry!" Harry started and looked over to her. When he saw her he smiled

"Hey Rose, Congratulations at getting into Ravenclaw." Roselyn smiled shyly,

"Thanks. So you're not mad?" Harry shook his head.

"No, I figured you'd be likely to get into that house. Your much smarter than you are brave." Roselyn laughed. She didn't need to be told because she knew that she was not very brave.

"Oh! And Harry, did you and Ron really fly to school?" She asked. Harry was about to answer when there was a rushing sound overhead and a hundred or so owls streamed in, circling the hall and dropping letters and packages into the chattering crowd, startling Roselyn as she watched. A big, lumpy package bounced off Neville's head and, a second later, something large and gray fell into Hermione's jug, spraying them all with milk and feathers.

"Errol!" said Ron, pulling the bedraggled owl out by the feet. Errol slumped, unconscious, onto the table, his legs in the air and a damp red envelope in his beak.

"Oh, no —" Ron gasped.

"It's all right, he's still alive," said Hermione, prodding Errol gently with the tip of her finger. Roselyn crinkled her nose in disgust.

"It's not that — it's that."

Ron was pointing at the red envelope. It looked quite ordinary to Roselyn, but Ron and Neville were both looking at it as though they expected it to explode.

"What's the matter?" said Harry.

"She's — she's sent me a Howler," said Ron faintly.

"You'd better open it, Ron," said Neville in a timid whisper. "It'll be worse if you don't. My gran sent me one once, and I ignored it and" — he gulped — "it was horrible."

Harry and Roselyn looked from their petrified faces to the red envelope.

"What's a Howler?" Harry asked.

But Ron's whole attention was fixed on the letter, which had begun to smoke at the corners.

"Open it," Neville urged. "It'll all be over in a few minutes —"

Ron stretched out a shaking hand, eased the envelope from Errol's beak, and slit it open. Neville stuffed his fingers in his ears. A split second later, Roselyn knew why. She thought for a moment it had exploded; a roar of sound filled the huge hall, shaking dust from the ceiling. Even though she had immediately clamped her hands over her ears, she could still hear the yelling,

"— _STEALING THE CAR, I WOULDN'T HAVE BEEN SURPRISED IF THEY'D EXPELLED YOU, YOU WAIT TILL I GET HOLD OF YOU, I DON'T SUPPOSE YOU STOPPED TO THINK WHAT YOUR FATHER AND I WENT THROUGH WHEN WE SAW IT WAS GONE —"_

Mrs. Weasley's yells, a hundred times louder than usual, made the plates and spoons rattle on the table, and echoed deafeningly off the stone walls. People throughout the hall were swiveling around to see who had received the Howler, and Ron sank so low in his chair that only his crimson forehead could be seen.

"— _LETTER FROM DUMBLEDORE LAST NIGHT, I THOUGHT YOUR FATHER WOULD DIE OF SHAME, WE DIDN'T BRING YOU UP TO BEHAVE LIKE THIS, YOU AND HARRY COULD BOTH HAVE DIED —"_

Roselyn could see that Harry was extremely upset and embarrassed as he sank down in his chair and tried to look like the letter wasn't screaming at them.

"— _ABSOLUTELY DISGUSTED — YOUR FATHER'S FAC¬ING AN INQUIRY AT WORK, IT'S ENTIRELY YOUR FAULT AND IF YOU PUT ANOTHER TOE OUT OF LINE WE'LL BRING YOU STRAIGHT BACK HOME."_

A ringing silence fell. The red envelope, which had dropped from Ron's hand, burst into flames and curled into ashes. Harry and Ron sat stunned, as though a tidal wave had just passed over them. A few people laughed and, gradually, a babble of talk broke out again.

Hermione closed Voyages with Vampires and looked down at the top of Ron's head.

"Well, I don't know what you expected, Ron, but you —"

"Don't tell me I deserved it," snapped Ron. Roselyn nodded, sending a disapproving glare at Hermione, she didn't think it was right of Mrs. Weasley to embarrass them in front of the whole school like that, but she didn't say anything.

Harry pushed his porridge away. Rosleyn patted his shoulder and went back to Ravenclaw table just in time to get her time table. She looked over at Luna who was reading a magazine upside down.

"Uhhh, Luna? You know that you're reading that upside down right?" Luna looked up, her eyes wide in surprise,

"Of course. Its easier to understand!" Roselyn blinked and nodded uncertainly.

"Oh, sorry. Uh, what is that?" She asked. Luna smiled and closed the magazine just enough to show her the cover. Roselyn tilted her head a bit so she could read "The Quibler, huh, what's that about?" She asked Luna, but before Luna could tell her, the other three girls that shared their room sat down across from them. The blond, that Roselyn had remembered was named Callie Trent, interrupted

"Don't pay any attention to that rag. It's full of crap, everyone know's that." She said snidely. Luna looked over at her sharply, her dreamy look having disappeared.

"It is not! It tells the truth, and my Dad is the editor." She said coldly. The three girls laughed meanly, but were unable to say anything because Professor Flitwick, the head of house came over with their time tables.

"Here you go girls." He said in his high squeaky voice before moving on. Roselyn looked down at it.

"Let's see. Looks like we have Defense against the Dark Arts with the Hufflepuffs first." Roselyn said, she looked up and over to Luna, eager to escape the conflict. "Would you like to walk to class with me?" Luna looked up, her dreamy look not quite back yet.

"Oh, yes. It is time to go isn't it?" The girls made their way out of the hall, and since Luna seemed to know where she was going, Roselyn decided to just follow her

"So, Luna, how many stairs do you think there are in Hogwarts?" Luna thought about it for a moment.

"I don't know. Maybe the answer is in Hogwarts: A History." She suggested. Roselyn smiled

"No, it does say how many staircases, but I thought maybe on a free day we could try and count them all." Luna thought about it before nodded

"Alright, but we'd also have to count he amount of trick steps."

"Of course we should." Roselyn nodded, glad that she had someone to explore with

When they got into DADA, they both took a seat in the center of class. To Rosleyn's horror, Gilderoy Lockheart was already their beaming at them.

"Me," he said, pointing and winking as well. "Gilderoy Lockhart, Order of Merlin, Third Class, Honorary Member of the Dark Force Defense League, and five-team winner of With Weekly's Most Charming Smile Award but I don't talk about that. I didn't get rid of that Bandon Banshee by smiling at her!" He waited for them to laugh; a few people smiled weakly. As Roselyn looked around she noticed that all of the girls but Luna and her were hanging onto his every word, even a fair few of the boys were looking at him in aww.

"I see you've all bought a complete set of my books – well done. I thought we'd start today with a little quiz. Nothing to worry about – just to check how well you've read them"

When he handed out the test papers he returned to the front of the class and said, "You have thirty minutes – start – now!"

Roselyn looked down at her paper and read:

1. What is Gilderoy Lockhart's favourite colour?

2. What is Gilderoy Lockhart's secret ambition?

3. What, in your opinion, is Gilderoy Lockhart's greatest achievement to date?

On and on it went, over three sheets of paper, right down to:

54. When is Gilderoy Lockhart's birthday, and what would his ideal gift be?"

Roselyn sighed, she was glad that she had read the books if only so that she could answer the questions. She still didn't know what it had to do with Defense though.

Half an hour later, Lockhart collected the papers and rifled through them in front of the class.

"Tut, tut – hardly any of you remembered that my favorite color is lilac. I say so in Year with the Yeti. And a few of you need to read Wandering with Werewolves more carefully – I clearly state in chapter twelve that my ideal birthday gift would be harmony between all magic and non-magic peoples – though I wouldn't say no to a large bottle of Ogdeds Old Firewhiskey!" He looked through them when his eyebrow raised

"Hmmm? Well, well, well. It looks like someone did read my books thoroughly. Roselyn Potter seems to have gotten all the answers correct! Well done Miss. Potter, 10 points to Ravenclaw." When her fellow classmates turned to look at her in surprise she scowled heavily at them. Before raising her hand. Lockheart smiled

"Yes Miss Potter?"

"I'm sorry Professor, but I'm not entirely sure what all this has to do with this class." Lockheart smiled pleasantly.

"Well Miss. Potter, it will be easier for you all to learn if you know about your teacher beforehand don't you think? After all, we'll be covering quite a bit of stuff this year." Roselyn nodded as though she understood what he was saying, even though she was quite sure that they didn't need to know their teacher to understand what was being taught.

"Well, that took a bit longer than anticipated, so for your homework I want you all to read the first chapter of Glading with Ghouls and be ready to discuss next time. Dissmised." As they all packed their bags to leave Lockheart called Roselyn to stay behind. Roselyn hesitated for a moment before turning to Luna

"Will you wait for me?" she asked. Luna nodded.

"I'll just be outside the door okay?" Roselyn nodded and made her way over to Lockheart.

"Ah, Roselyn, Roselyn, Roselyn, Roselyn." Roselyn just raised her eyebrow, wondering what this was about.

"Am I in trouble sir?" Lockheart laughed heartily as if she had just told an extremely funny joke

"Oh no, my dear, but I just wanted to offer my help." Roselyn was taken aback, it was the first day of school and she hadn't had a chance to really see what she was and wasn't good at.

"For what?" she asked.

"Well my dear, well, it has to be hard to live in your brothers shadow, so I thought that I would offer my help in getting you more recognized. Of course, you won't be nearly as famous as me. And you have a bit to do in order to catch up to your brother. So don't hesitate to ask for my help." Roselyn scowled in irritation. She loved her brother dearly, but if everyone was going to compare them, it would get very old, very fast.

"Thank you sir, but no thanks. I don't really want to be known." She said. Lockheart smiled patronizingly at her.

"Ah, you think that now. But if you ever change your mind, I'm here to help." Roselyn tried to keep her expression neutral

"Thank you sir. Good day." She utterd before she stomped out of the room

"That… That….. He's got to be completely mad." She said angrily as she stomped past Luna

"Yes, he does have a rather bad infestation of Nargles, doesn't he?" Roselyn blinked and turned to looked to Luna, she had forgotten the other girl was waiting for her and had stormed straight past. Once Luna caught up to her, they continued on down the stairs.

"Uhh, what are Nargles?" she asked.

"Oh, their invisible creatures that fly around your head and makes it all fuzy." Roselyn thought about it then nodded decisively,

"Then yes. He must have the most ever to have… not, been, seen…." Roselyn frowned as she thought about that sentence before shrugging and asking, "What do we have next?"

"Herbology in greenhouse one with the Gryffindors." Luna looked at her schedule she said. Roselyn gasped and grabbed Luna, dragging her along,

"Excellent. I want you to meet my friends Ginny Weasly and Colin Creevy." Luna smiled as she let herself be drug along.

"I know Ginny Weasley, she doesn't live to far from me." She commented. Roselyn slowed down as they came to a large group of people and she saw Harry, Ron, Hermione, Colin, and Malfoy and his goons all standing in the center of the commotion.

"lets go see what's happening." She muttered, pushing her way over to them. They got close enough to hear some of what was being said

"Jealous?" said Malfoy. "Of what? I don't want a foul scar right across my head, thanks. I don't think getting your head cut open makes you that special, myself." Crabbe and Goyle were sniggering stupidly.

"Eats slugs, Malfoy." Said Ron angrily. Crabbe stopped laughing and stating rubbing his knuckles in a menacing way.

"Be careful, Weasley," sneered Malfoy. "You don't want to start any trouble or your Mummy'll have to come and take you away from school." He put on shrill, piercing voice. "'If you put another toe out of line'-" A knot of Slytherin fifth-years nearby laughed loudly at this.

"Weasley would like a signed photo, Potter," smirked Malfoy loudly. "It'd be worth more than his family's whole house-"

"Why that-" Roselyn scowled and started to move forward when Ron whipped out his Spellotaped wand, but Hermione shut Voyages with Vampires with a snap and whispered, "Look out!"

"What's all this, what's all this?" Gilderoy Lockhart was striding toward them, his turquoise robes swirling around him. "Who's giving out signed photos?"

Harry started to speak but he was cut short as Lockhart flung an arm around his shoulders and thundered jovially, "Shouldn't have asked! We meet again, Harry!"

Lockheart pinned Harry to his side as Malfoy and his goons slid away. Roselyn felt sorry for her brother, but didn't want to get caught by Lockheart again. So she and Luna hung back, because she wanted to talk to Colin when he was done.

"Come on then, Mr. Creevey," said Lockhart, beaming at Colin. "A double portrait, can't do better than that, and we'll both sign it for you."

Colin fumbled for his camera and took the picture as the bell rang behind them, signaling the start of afternoon classes.

"Off you go, move along there," Lockhart called to the crowd, and he set off back to the castle with Harry, who looked like he wanted to sink into the ground. As they disappeared into the castle, Roselyn made her way over to Colin

"Colin!" Colin looked up from his camera and smiled excitedly when he saw her.

"Roselyn! Roselyn look! I got a picture with Harry AND Gilderoy Lockheart! Isn't that so cool?" Roselyn frowned and sighed

"Colin, Harry doesn't want all that. He just wants to be treated like everyone else." Colin frowned as he looked down to his camera.

"Oh, well. I just wanted a picture to prove to my parents that I really did meet him." Roselyn shook her head.

"Okay, well, this is Luna Lovegood. She's my friend from Ravenclaw." Luna looked at her in surprise, as though she was surprised that Roselyn had called her a friend. Colin smiled and shook her hand enthusiastically

"Hi! I'm Colin Creevey, I'm a muggleborn and it's really exciting to get to come here don't you think? Can I walk to class with you? I think we all have Herbology together next."

During Herbolgy Ginny met up with them and they all sat together while they listened to Professor Sprout talk about how the class was run and the rules that she expected them to follow in her class.

Roselyn found that all of her professor's, bar Lockheart, were wonderful and she didn't have very many problems actually doing the magic. She had quickly mastered the levitation charm as well as the spell to turn her quill into a needle. And, she did really well in Potions, and to everyone's surprise, Professor Snape actually liked her.

The very first Potions class they had, they had with the Slythrins, which Roslyn (after asking Luna if it was alright) sat with Astoria. Despite the fact that they were in different houses, Roselyn found that she was becoming fast friends with the other girl.

The two had been talking, both to each other and to Luna who was seated behind them when Professor Snape came swooping in, his black robes swirling around him. He turned and sneered at the class,

"You are here to lean the subtle science and exact art of potion-making," he began. He spoke in barely more than a whisper, but they caught every word – Roselyn could immediately tell that this was a person who didn't put up with non-sense and was subtly passionate about his topic, despite the rumor that he wanted the DADA position.

"As there is little foolish wand-waving, many of you will hardly believe this is magic. I don't expect you will really understand the beauty of the softly simmering cauldron with its shimmering fumes, the delicate power of liquids that creep through human veins, bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses. . . . I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, even stopper death - if you aren't as bit a bunch of dunderheads as I usually have to teach." He looked around, his eyes landing on Roselyn, who was writing everything he said down in her notes, just as she had done with every Professor.

"Miss. Potter, could you so kindly inform me as to what it is that has you more interested than what I'm saying." Roselyn looked up in surprise.

"Nothing Professor, I'm just taking notes on what you're saying." Professor Snape raised an eyebrow and walked over to where she was to see that she had indeed been writing it down. And not only that, but she also had the notes from the black board down already. Professor Snape pressed his lips together as his eyebrow raised, studying her for a moment before he looked to the rest of the class

"It seems that Miss. Potter is indeed copying down all the notes today, something that you should all be doing, 5 points to Ravenclaw." Everyone stared in surprise at him; it was no secret that he favored Slythrin. Professor Snape scowled when nobody moved,

"Well? What are you waiting for?" and everyone scrambled to write down what he said and the instructions from the blackboard. Later, after their first attempt at making the cure for boils, Roselyn and Astoria both got 5 points for having a perfect potion.

When they left class Roselyn was absolutely thrilled, though she often earned points.

"How great was that? It seems that I was worried about him hating me for no reason!" she said, Astoria nodded, puzzled

"That was strange; Professor Snape never rewards other houses students from what I hear." Astoria said as Luna came up and stated in her dreamy state.

"Maybe Roselyn reminds him of someone he liked." The other two girls looked at her, before looking at each other and shrugging

"That's possible." Astoria admitted reluctantly. Roselyn tried to hide a smile, she knew that Astoria didn't like Luna very much because of her so called made up creatures, but put up with her because Roselyn liked her.

Overall, Roselyn had thought it was a wonderful first week to school.


	7. Chapter 7

**Disclaimer: Don't own Harry Potter. I do own Roselyn.**

**A/N: Okay, from here on out i'll only do one chapter a week. please keep reading and reviewing though!**

**Chapter 7: Mudbloods and Murmurs**

Roselyn had a hard time trying to catch her brother to talk with him over the next few days. If he wasn't trying to hide from Lockheart, (Not that she blamed him for that, even she hid when she saw him coming), then he was hiding from Colin who didn't seem to hear her when she told him to just leave him alone. Despite the fact that Hedwig was mad at Harry, she and Artemis would often come to see her at breakfast and grab some of her toast before flying off to who knows where.

Roselyn had also become quite good friends with Astoria, Kara, and Luna, even though Astoria only tolerated Luna, but Roselyn was quite sad that Ginny had seemed to pull away from her some. She had put this down as being homesick though and didn't pressure her.

Once the weekend came Roselyn found herself over at the Gryffindor table next to Ron and Hermione wondering where Harry was.

"Where's Harry?" she asked. They looked at each other before looking back at her

"He had a quidditch practice early this morning. We were going to go down and see if he will be done soon." Hermione said. Roselyn frowned, disheartened, she was hoping that now that they were at the same school that she and Harry would be a lot closer than the previous year, but so far she had barely even seen him past that first day, let alone been able to talk to him. Hermione must have caught the younger girls distress because she then said, "Do you want to come with us?" Roselyn looked up at them hopefully

"Can I?" Ron nodded and shrugged, grabbing some toast, not seeming to mind his best friends little sister coming with them,

"Sure, lets go." Roselyn smiled and followed cheerfully behind them. Once they got out of the Great Hall though Hermione turned to look at her

"How are you liking classes so far Rose?" Roselyn's eyes lit up

"Their wonderful! Magic is by far the best thing ever!" she said, nodding in order to drive her point home.

"Had a class with Snape yet?" Ron asked. Roselyn nodded with a slight smile.

"Yep, I rather like potions and Snape's really not that bad. He even rewarded me with some house points." The other two stopped and looked at her in disbelief.

"Seriously?" Roselyn nodded

"Ten points. But he doesn't seem that bad." The two stared at her before looking at each other, shaking their heads and continuing on. When they got there the field was empty, with only Colin in the stands looking slightly board at the moment. Luckily, the team came out of the locker room after about three minutes

"Aren't you finished yet?" called Ron to Harry incredulously.

"Haven't even started," said Harry, looking jealously at the toast and marmalade the three of them had brought out. "Wood's been teaching us new moves."

He mounted his broomstick and kicked at the ground, soaring up into the air. Roselyn's jaw nearly dropped, Harry had explained the game to her over the summer, but she had yet to fly herself. Watching them all fly around was amazing.

"What's that funny clicking noise?" she could hear Fred call as they hurtled around the corner.

Colin was sitting in one of the highest seats, his camera raised, taking picture after picture, the sound strangely magnified in the deserted stadium.

"Look this way, Harry! This way!" he cried shrilly.

Roselyn sighed and tried to ignore him. Hermione looked sympathetically at her. Roselyn watched them converse in the air for a moment before Fred pointed to something at the far end.

Everybody looked over to see several people in green robes were walking onto the field, broomsticks in their hands.

"Uh oh, this spells trouble, lets go see what's happening." Hermione muttered as all four of the spectators raced down to the stands

Wood shot toward the ground, landing rather harder than he meant to in his anger, staggering slightly as he dismounted. Harry, Fred, and George followed.

Rosleyn watched the two team captains have, what looked like, a very heated discussion, at least on Wood's part. She quickly studied both teams and only noticed, when Alicia, Angelina, and Katie joined the boy's, that the Slythrin team had no girls. She also noticed that they were all holding out shiny new brooms to show the other team when her, Ron, Hermione, and Colin joined the little party.

"What's happening?" Ron asked Harry. "Why aren't you playing? And what's he doing here?"

He was looking at Malfoy, taking in his Slytherin Quidditch robes.

"I'm the new Slytherin Seeker, Weasley," said Malfoy, smugly. "Everyone's just been admiring the brooms my father's bought our team."

Ron gaped, open-mouthed, at the seven superb broomsticks in front of him. Roselyn just frowned, she didn't think they should let people buy their way on to the team, after all, what if someone was better than him?

"Good, aren't they?" said Malfoy smoothly. "But perhaps the Gryffindor team will be able to raise some gold and get new brooms, too. You could raffle off those Cleansweep Fives; I expect a museum would bid for them."

The Slytherin team howled with laughter.

"At least no one on the Gryffindor team had to buy their way in," said Hermione sharply. "They got in on pure talent."

The smug look on Malfoy's face flickered.

"No one asked your opinion, you filthy little Mudblood," he spat.

Roselyn knew at once that Malfoy had said something really bad because there was an instant uproar at his words. Flint had to dive in front of Malfoy to stop Fred and George jumping on him, Alicia shrieked, "How dare you!" and Ron plunged his hand into his robes, pulled out his wand, yelling, "You'll pay for that one, Malfoy!" and pointed it furiously under Flint's arm at Malfoys face. Roselyn winced and leapt forward to try and stop him; she seemed to be the only one that remembered his wand was broken.

A loud bang echoed around the stadium and a jet of green light shot out of the wrong end of Ron's wand, hitting him in the stomach and sending him reeling backward onto the grass, just barely missing Roslyn, who had pulled back just in time.

"Ron! Ron! Are you all right?" squealed Hermione.

Ron opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out. Instead he gave an almighty belch and several slugs dribbled out of his mouth onto his lap.

The Slytherin team were paralyzed with laughter. Flint was doubled up, hanging onto his new broomstick for support. Malfoy was on all fours, banging the ground with his fist. The Gryffindors were gathered around Ron, who kept belching large, glistening slugs. Nobody seemed to want to touch him.

"We'd better get him to Hagrid's, it's nearest," said Harry to Hermione, who nodded bravely, and the pair of them pulled Ron up by the arms. Roselyn stuck close to the three while trying to think of the counter curse. But she couldn't think while Colin was bugging them.

"What happened, Harry? What happened? Is he ill? But you can cure him, can't you?" Colin was now dancing alongside them as they left the field. Ron gave a huge heave and more slugs dribbled down his front.

"Oooh," said Colin, fascinated and raising his camera. "Can you hold him still, Harry?"

"Get out of the way, Colin!" said Harry angrily. He and Hermione supported Ron out of the stadium and across the grounds toward the edge of the forest, Roselyn trailing behind them.

"Nearly there, Ron," said Hermione as the gamekeeper's cabin came into view. "You'll be all right in a minute — almost there —"

They were within twenty feet of Hagrid's house when the front door opened, but it wasn't Hagrid who emerged. Gilderoy Lockhart, wearing robes of palest mauve today, came striding out.

"Quick, behind here," Harry hissed, dragging Ron behind a nearby bush. Hermione followed, somewhat reluctantly. Roselyn had dived behind the bush faster than all three since she neither wanted to see the man, nor did she have to drag someone with her.

"It's a simple matter if you know what you're doing!" Lockhart was saying loudly to Hagrid. "If you need help, you know where I am! I'll let you have a copy of my book. I'm surprised you haven't already got one — I'll sign one tonight and send it over. Well, good-bye!" And he strode away toward the castle.

Harry waited until Lockhart was out of sight, then pulled Ron out of the bush and up to Hagrid's front door. They knocked urgently.

Hagrid appeared at once, looking very grumpy, but his expression brightened when he saw who it was.

"Bin wonderin' when you'd come ter see me — come in, come in — thought you mighta bin Professor Lockhart back again —"

Roselyn looked around the room while Harry and Hermione supported Ron over the threshold into the one-roomed cabin, which had an enormous bed in one corner, a fire crackling merrily in the other. Hagrid didn't seem perturbed by Ron's slug problem, which Harry hastily explained as he lowered Ron into a chair.

"Better out than in," he said cheerfully, plunking a large copper basin in front of him. "Get 'em all up, Ron."

"I don't think there's anything to do except wait for it to stop," said Hermione anxiously, watching Ron bend over the basin. "That's a difficult curse to work at the best of times, but with a broken wand —"

"Hey, at least we know that Ron can in fact work the curse. When you get a new wand you can try again." Roselyn said cheerfully. Hermione sent a slight disapproving glare at her while Harry was trying not to smile. Ron gave her a grateful smile before disappearing into the basin again.

Hagrid was bustling around making them tea. His boarhound, Fang, was slobbering over Harry.

"What did Lockhart want with you, Hagrid?" Harry asked, scratching Fang's ears.

"Givin' me advice on gettin' kelpies out of a well," growled Hagrid, moving a half-plucked rooster off his scrubbed table and setting down the teapot. "Like I don' know. An' bangin' on about some banshee he banished. If one word of it was true, I'll eat my kettle."

Roselyn looked at him in surprise, he had always been such a cheery fellow, other than when he yelled at the Dursely's and gave Dudley a pigs tail, she didn't think he could get upset with anyone. Hermione, however, said in a voice somewhat higher than usual, "I think you're being a bit unfair. Professor Dumbledore obviously thought he was the best man for the job —"

"He was the on'y man for the job," said Hagrid, offering them a plate of treacle fudge, while Ron coughed squelchily into his basin. "An' I mean the on'y one. Gettin' very difficult ter find anyone fer the Dark Arts job. People aren't too keen ter take it on, see. They're startin' ter think it's jinxed. No one's lasted long fer a while now. So tell me," said Hagrid, jerking his head at Ron. "Who was he tryin' ter curse?"

"Malfoy called Hermione something — it must've been really bad, because everyone went wild." Harry tried to explain, taking a piece of fudge and biting into it. Roselyn watched in slight fascination as his jaw seemed to glue itself shut when he tried to chew it.

"It was bad," said Ron hoarsely, emerging over the tabletop looking pale and sweaty. "Malfoy called her 'Mudblood,' Hagrid —"

Ron dived out of sight again as a fresh wave of slugs made their appearance. Hagrid looked outraged.

"He didn'!" he growled at Hermione.

"He did," she said. "But I don't know what it means. I could tell it was really rude, of course —"

"It's about the most insulting thing he could think of," gasped Ron, coming back up. "Mudblood's a really foul name for someone who is Muggle-born — you know, non-magic parents. There are some wizards — like Malfoy's family — who think they're better than everyone else because they're what people call pure-blood." He gave a small burp, and a single slug fell into his outstretched hand. He threw it into the basin and continued, "I mean, the rest of us know it doesn't make any difference at all. Look at Neville Longbottom — he's pure-blood and he can hardly stand a cauldron the right way up."

"An' they haven't invented a spell our Hermione can' do," said Hagrid proudly, making Hermione go a brilliant shade of magenta.

"It's a disgusting thing to call someone," said Ron, wiping his sweaty brow with a shaking hand. "Dirty blood, see. Common blood. It's ridiculous. Most wizards these days are half-blood anyway. If we hadn't married Muggles we'd've died out." Roselyn nodded and chimed in

"Don't listen to him Hermione, he clearly doesn't know what he's talking about. He was just mad because he knew you were right about the team."

Ron retched and ducked out of sight again.

"Well, I don' blame yeh fer tryin' ter curse him, Ron," said Hagrid loudly over the thuds of more slugs hitting the basin. "Bu' maybe it was a good thing yer wand backfired. 'Spect Lucius Malfoy would've come marchin' up ter school if yeh'd cursed his son. Least yer not in trouble."

Roselyn rose an eyebrow and looked at Ron who was still burping up slugs and wrinkled her nose 'I suppose if that's not trouble then I'm not really sure I want to know what is.' She thought to herself.

"Harry," said Hagrid abruptly as though struck by a sudden thought. "Gotta bone ter pick with yeh. I've heard you've bin givin' out signed photos. How come I haven't got one?"

Furious, Harry wrenched his teeth apart.

"I have not been giving out signed photos," he said hotly. "If Lockhart's still spreading that around —"

But then he saw that Hagrid was laughing.

"I'm on'y jokin'," he said, patting Harry genially on the back and sending him face first into the table. "I knew yeh hadn't really. I told Lockhart yeh didn' need teh. Yer more famous than him without tryin'." Roselyn giggled, 'oh to have been a fly on the wall for that conversation' she thought, wishing she could have seen Lockharts face when told that.

"Bet he didn't like that," said Harry, sitting up and rubbing his chin.

"Don' think he did," said Hagrid, his eyes twinkling. "An' then I told him I'd never read one o' his books an' he decided ter go. Treacle fudge, Ron?" he added as Ron reappeared.

"No thanks," said Ron weakly. "Better not risk it."

"Come an' see what I've bin growin'," said Hagrid as Harry, Roselyn and Hermione finished the last of their tea.

In the small vegetable patch behind Hagrid's house were a dozen of the largest pumpkins Roselyn had ever seen. Each was the size of a large boulder.

"Gettin' on well, aren't they?" said Hagrid happily. "Fer the Halloween feast… should be big enough by then."

"What've you been feeding them?" said Harry.

Hagrid looked over his shoulder to check that they were alone.

"Well, I've bin givin' them — you know — a bit o' help —"

Roselyn recognized the pink umbrella leaning against the cabin as the same one he swung around to give Dudley his pigs tail.

Roselyn had long ago figured that his wand was hidden inside it, that or the handle actually was the wand. Hagrid wasn't supposed to use magic. He had been expelled from Hogwarts in his third year, but she nor Harry had never found out why.

"An Engorgement Charm, I suppose?" said Hermione, halfway between disapproval and amusement. "Well, you've done a good job on them."

"That's what yer little sister said," said Hagrid, nodding at Ron. "Met her jus' yesterday." Hagrid looked sideways at Harry, his beard twitching. "Said she was jus' lookin' round the grounds, but I reckon she was hopin' she might run inter someone else at my house." He winked at Harry. "If yeh ask me, she wouldn' say no ter a signed —"

"Oh, shut up," said Harry. Roselyn frowned, wondering why Ginny hadn't invited her while Ron snorted with laughter and the ground was sprayed with slugs.

"Watch it!" Hagrid roared, pulling Ron away from his precious pumpkins.

It was nearly lunchtime and Roselyn was ready to go and eat, she also wanted to find Ginny and see why she didn't seem to want to hang out with her anymore. They said good-bye to Hagrid and walked back up to the castle, Ron hiccoughing occasionally, but only bringing up two very small slugs.

They had barely set foot in the cool entrance hall when a voice rang out, "There you are, Potter — Weasley." Professor McGonagall was walking toward them, looking stern. "You will both do your detentions this evening."

"What're we doing, Professor?" said Ron, nervously suppressing a burp.

"You will be polishing the silver in the trophy room with Mr. Filch," said Professor McGonagall. "And no magic, Weasley — elbow grease."

Roselyn gave Ron a sympathetic look, she hadn't been at school for long, but even she didn't like Filch. It was a well know fact that Argus Filch, the caretaker, was loathed by every student in the school.

"And you, Potter, will be helping Professor Lockhart answer his fan mail," said Professor McGonagall. Roselyn crinkled her nose, suddenly feeling very sorry for her brother.

"Oh n — Professor, can't I go and do the trophy room, too?" said Harry desperately.

"Certainly not," said Professor McGonagall, raising her eyebrows. "Professor Lockhart requested you particularly. Eight o'clock sharp, both of you." Roselyn frowned at her.

"I thought you didn't condone torture here Professor." she said. The corner of Professor McGonagall's mouth twitched but she didn't say anything and continued on her way.

Harry and Ron slouched into the Great Hall in states of deepest gloom, Hermione behind them, wearing a well-you-did-break-school-rules sort of expression. Roselyn sighed

"Harry, can we maybe hang out tomorrow?" she asked, looking at him hopefully. Harry looked at her and gave a weak smile, but Roselyn didn't take offence, especially after knowing what his detention would be

"Of course, lets meet down by the great lake after breakfast okay?" Roselyn smiled and gave him a hug

"Thanks Harry, I'm going to go talk to Ginny." She walked over to where the red headed girl was sitting and sat next to her

"Hey Ginny, what have you been up to? I haven't seen much of you outside of class." Ginny looked up and gave a brief uncomfortable look before smiling

"Sorry Rose, I guess I've just been sort of home sick." Roselyn smiled sympathetically at her, she didn't really understand that because she really didn't miss the Dursleys, but she knew that Ginny was really close to her parents.

"I'm sorry Gin. Tell you what, how about we get Luna and Astoria and go down and explore the grounds?"

"Astoria Greengrass?" Ginny asked hesitantly. Roselyn nodded before pausing and looking closer at Ginny who was eyeing the Slythrin table where Astoria sat with a distrustful eye. Roselyn frowned "Ginny, don't judge her before you meet her just because of what house she's in. She's really quite nice. I think you would get along with her if you gave her a chance." Ginny flushed at being caught and bit her lip before nodding, slowly grinning.

"Oh ok. You go get her and I'll get Luna and we'll go explore the grounds." Roselyn hopped up and smiled excitedly.

"Great, meet you just outside the Great Hall ok?" they both nodded and Roselyn walked confidently over to the Slythrin table.

"Hey, Astoria!" She called as she came into ear shot of the dark haired girls, when they looked up to see Roselyn, she continued, "Ginny, Luna and I were going down to explore the grounds, would you like to come with us?" She sat down in next to her, to the general astonishment of the other Slythrins. Astoria nodded and got up, keeping her face from showing to much emotion.

"Sure." Astoria said before she paused and tilted her head as she glanced uncertainly over to Luna and Ginny who had just left, "You sure they're okay with me coming?" Roselyn sighed, she knew that Astoria was talking about Ginny, seeing as how she didn't care too much for Luna.

"Ya, I'm sure. Ginny is willing to give you a chance, so just don't be a complete prat and you'll get along." Astoria giggled

"In other words don't act like Draco Malfoy and his friends?" Roselyn gave a cheeky grin.

"Exactly. And considering you're nothing like him, there won't be a problem!" The two laughed as they exited the Hall to meet the other two. When they met up Roselyn introduced them

"Ginny, this is Astoria. Astoria, this is Ginny." The two girls smiled hesitantly until Roselyn clapped her hands

"Great! Now all we need is a brunette and our group will be complete!" the four girls looked at each other for a moment before bursting out into giggles.

"Yes, but if you want one of each hair color then you or I need to change the color of our hair." Ginny said, with a teasing smirk. Roselyn thought about it before nodding

"Yes, that must mean that you need to color your hair because there's only enough room for one ginger and that's me." Ginny mock scoffed as the group started to make its way out of the entryway.

"Why do you get to keep your hair?" She asked incredulously.

"She is after all the oldest." Luna said, nodding sagely.

"So?" Ginny pouted. Astoria rolled her eyes and laughed.

"I don't know about you three, but I thought we were out here to explore the grounds, not argue about hair color. And anyways, neither of you have the same color red, Ginny has a lovely auburn red color and Roselyn's is a nice strawberry blond color." Roselyn and Ginny blinked at each other, shrugged then laughed and headed out the door.

"Your right, let's go see what we can find." Roselyn said, leading the way. After walking around the grounds for a bit the group decided to go back inside and count the stairs, accidently finding the kitchens when they found the picture of a bowl of fruit and Roselyn reached up to point at the pear, and touched it, making it giggle and swing open.

"Wow!" Roselyn said in surprise when a huge group of house elves turned to greet the girls.

"Hello Missus's! what can Milly do for you?" Asked a slightly older looking elf. The girls blinked at eachother before Astoria asked,

"Uh, can we have some pumpkin juice?" The elves chattered as they quickly brought the four girls their drinks.

"Thank you!" They coursed together before downing their drinks and leaving.

"I didn't know Hogwarts had House elves!" Roselyn said when the portrait finally closed behind them.

"Yes, they're house elves that have been mistreated and were released from serving their masters for whatever reason and came to Hogwarts." Luna said as they continued to explore. Roselyn nodded thoughtfully,

"Well, at least they all seem very happy." She said. Ginny laughed and nodded,

"Seem? They were all practically clamoring to help! I think they were pretty pleased." She said, the girls all laughed before continuing on their way

The next day Roselyn waited for Harry as they had agreed out by the lake after breakfast. As she waited she pulled her art book and pencil and started to draw the lake. As the day progressed and her drawing became closer to being done Roselyn started to become impatient with Harry. 'where is he?' she wondered as she looked around. She suddenly spotted him sitting a bit farther away with Ron and Hermione, they were all talking about something or other and Roselyn frowned, hurt that he would forget about her for his friends.

Roselyn stood up and strode angrily over to him.

"If you didn't want to come on a walk with me you could have just told me, rather than blow me off completely. I thought that we'd still be able to hang out when we came here, but you haven't seemed to want to talk to me at all." She sniffed and blinked back tears before turning on her heels and running away. She ignored her brother's startled yell for her to wait and got all the way to the lake before she tripped and landed on her hands and knees. She hissed as she pulled her hand up to examine. She had cut open her hand on a sharp rock.

"Rosie! Are you okay?" she heard Harry's voice right behind her. She huffed and sat on the ground and rubbed the back of her hands on her eyes to keep the tears from falling.

"I'm fine. Go away." But instead of going away, Harry sat down next to her and grabbed her injured palm, examining it before bending over and blowing on it gently.

"I'm sorry Rosie." He muttered, "I didn't mean to forget. I just…" He sighed and shifted uneasily. "I had a bad night." Roselyn looked over to him and studied him, and he did in deed look like he had a sleepless night what with the dark circles under his eyes

"What happened?" She asked softly, not sure if she was ready to forgive him yet. Harry frowned before recounting his detention and the voice he heard. Roselyn frowned thoughtfully

"Hmmm, I highly doubt that Lockheart heard the voice, I mean, the guys a complete ponce and probably couldn't lie to save his life…. I dunno Harry, I'd go tell Dumbledore at least." Harry frowned and shook his head

"Nah, maybe if I hear it again k? for now, I believe I promised to hang out with you today." Roselyn studied him closely before sighing and nodding. She let him help her up and they started to meander around the lake.

"So how are your classes going?" He asked her curiously. Roselyn smiled excitedly.

"Oooh! I love them! I especially love Charm's and Potions, though Transfiguration is good too." Harry looked at her in surprise,

"You like Potions? Really?" Roselyn nodded.

"Yes! I'm really good at them and Professor Snape's not to bad, a little bad tempered, but he's okay." Harry stared at her in disbelief for a moment before shaking his head in confusion.

"I don't get it. If he like's you, then why did he immediately hate me so much?" he asked. Roselyn shrugged,

"You told me that last year Professor Dumbledore told you that he and dad didn't like each other, and everyone that knew dad say's you look just like him, so maybe that's why." She theorized. Harry thought about it for a moment before shrugging, a scowl on his face,

"Well, he doesn't have to take it out on me." He said. Roselyn just giggled and led the topic elsewhere.


	8. Chapter 8

**Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, just Kara and Rose**

**A/N: OK, here's the next chapter, sorry it's a bit short but i hope you like it. please read and review.**

Chapter 8: The Deathday Party.

October arrived, spreading a damp chill over the grounds and into the castle. Madam Pomfrey, the nurse, was kept busy by a sudden spate of colds among the staff and students. Her Pepperup potion worked instantly, though it left the drinker smoking at the ears for several hours afterward. Ginny, who had been looking pale, was bullied into taking some by Percy. The steam pouring from under her vivid hair gave the impression that her whole head was on fire, much to Roselyn's amusement.

Raindrops the size of bullets thundered on the castle windows for days on end; the lake rose, the flower beds turned into muddy streams, and Hagrid's pumpkins swelled to the size of garden sheds. Roselyn quickly fell into a comfortable routine with her lessons, being with her friends and her brother, and getting to know her way around the school. She found that as time passed people stopped looking at her and comparing her to Harry, and that made her much happier.

The only thing that was disheartening was that Ginny seemed to be pulling away a bit, Roselyn, more often than not found her holed up somewhere writing in her diary. When she wasn't immersed in her diary she was often pale and a little out of sorts.

Luna was also having a hard time with the bullying, though it didn't seem to bother her at all, Roselyn was upset that people picked on her and often wanted to go tell Professor Flitwick.

"It really doesn't bother me. Those who do it are people I don't much care for." Came the dreamy reply when Roselyn would broach the topic, though Roselyn took to threatening to hex people when she heard the rude whispers about her friend.

Astoria though turned out to be a wonderful friend. She would often encourage Roselyn to do things that she was unsure of or if she contemplated what Harry would think for too long, saying that if she only ever did what Harry approved of they wouldn't be friends in the first place and that there would be no point in having her own brain if she didn't use it.

Sometime just before Halloween Harry approached her looking irritated. She blinked and looked at him

"Whats up Harry?" she asked hesitantly. He sighed

"I promised Nick, you know our house ghost that I'd attend his Deathday party Halloween night, do you want to come?" Roselyn blinked and wrinkled her nose

"Deathday? Uhh, no thanks Harry, I think I'd rather attend the feast if you don't mind." Harry sighed and nodded

"I don't blame you. I'd rather go to the feast too, but I promised Nick I'd go since he got me out of detention the other night." Roselyn raised an eyebrow

"What'd you do this time? I thought you'd be avoiding detention." Harry groaned

"I was going back to the common room after quidditch practice and I was all muddy, I started talking to Nick when Filch caught me and tried to give me detention. Nick went and caused a distraction so that I could get out." Roselyn nodded

"I see. Well, try to have fun. You might want to eat before you go through. I don't think a ghost will be able to eat human food." Harry nodded and turned to leave before hesitating and turning back to her

"Rose, I've been meaning to ask but, I heard you were friends with a Slythrin, is that true?" Roselyn looked at Harry's face, seeing the disapproval, and she immediately became defensive of her friend

"Yes I am. Her name is Astoria Greengrass, why? What's wrong with being her friend?" Harry hesitated, startled to see the stubborn and defiant look on his little sisters face before saying

"I just want you to be careful Rose, Slythrins aren't…. they aren't really good friends to have." Roselyn frowned and crossed her arms

"Why not? Astoria is really sweet. Just because she's a Slythrin doesn't automatically make them evil. And you did say that if I got into Slythrin that you would still love me so I don't see what the problem is with me having one as a friend. I mean, its not like she's Malfoy, and she's not biased." Harry's eyebrows rose in surprise, Roselyn very rarely got upset with him for things like this.

"Rose, you know what people say about Slythrin." He cut off at the absolutely mutinous look on her face.

"THAT was a very Durslyish thing to say Harry. Do you actually know any Slytherins or are you basing them all on Malfoy and his goons?" Harry was brought up short. He paused then said softly

"Your right, and I'm sorry Rose, can I meet your friend?" Roselyn paused, looking at Harry for any sign of mistrust and found none, so she nodded

"Of course, why don't we meet up after Halloween?" Harry nodded

"Alright, we can meet outside of the Great Hall at Breakfast." He then went back over to his friends and continued on his way to wherever he was going while Roselyn went on to the Library. She wanted to sit somewhere and draw quietly, away from everyone else for awhile.

After about an hour of drawing she noted that someone was standing a few feet away. She looked up and saw that it was a Gryfindor boy with a round face and sandy hair looking shyly at her. When he saw her looking he flushed before asking

"Uh, hi, do you mind if I sit and do my homework here?" Roselyn nodded and gestured to the seat next to her

"Uh, sure. I'm Roselyn, Roselyn Potter, you can call me Rose, but never Rosie!"

"I know, I'm Neville Longbottom, I share a dorm with your brother." The boy said, smiling shyly at her as he sat down. Roselyn smiled at him, she remembered Harry telling her about him.

"oh, you're the one that won Gryfindor the house cup last year." Neville blushed and started to splutter,

"Oh… I, I didn't win it." Roselyn tilted her head and looked at him with a smile on her face.

"that's not what Harry said, he said that your ten points tilted the scale and it caused Gryffindor to win" Neville ducked his head

"well, it wasn't all me." Roselyn smiled and shrugged, leaving it alone since he was so embarrassed and when back to her drawing. Neville sat down and pulled out some of his homework. They sat in silence for a little, Roselyn drawing and Neville trying to do his homework, but Roselyn could see that Neville was quickly becoming frustrated with it. After a few moments Roselyn sighed and put her drawing pad down and scooted over to him.

"What are you working on?" Neville was startled and looked up before flushing and saying

"I'm trying to do my Potions homework, but I'm not very good at it." Roselyn nodded and looked at him thoughtfully before saying,

"Can I help? I'm rather good at potions." Neville looked uncertainly at her.

"I dunno, this is second year stuff." Roselyn shrugged and smiled

"That's okay, I read all of Harry's books and I'm sure I can still help." She thought about it for a moment before nodding, "I'll help you with potions and you can help me with Herbology." She didn't really need a lot of help in Herbology but she could admit that it was not her strongest subject by a long shot, this was more of a chance to help Neville with his confidence and to get to know him better. Neville though didn't seem very certain.

"I dunno, I'm not that good-" Roselyn cut him off

"Harry told me you're the best in your year in that class. Even Hermione said that you're better than her. You're the perfect person to tutor me." Neville blinked before giving in his face having turned a new shade of red.

"Alright then." Roselyn smiled and looked down to see what he was doing, "Alright, this is what you need to do." And she launched into explanations, stopping every once and a while to make sure he was still following. After they were done Neville smiled at her

"Thanks Rose. I was getting worried about passing." He looked over to her notepad curiously, "What were you doing before I came in?" this time Roselyn blushed

"Oh, I was drawing. I like to draw and came in here to draw for a while." Neville nodded

"Can I see?" Roselyn hesitated a moment before giving her pad to him

"But you can't make fun okay?" Neville gave her a look and said seriously,

"Of course I won't." He then proceeded to look through her pictures. Roselyn waited nervously for his opinion. She didn't share her pictures with people often because she was afraid that they wouldn't like them. The only person she really showed pictures to was her brother and Mr. Lupin. After a few nerve racking moments Neville gave it back to her and smiled at her

"Those are really good Rose! But why don't you do more pictures of people? Those are mostly scenery stuff." Roselyn paused a moment before saying

"Well, I need people to stand still to get use to drawing them, and no one wants to stay still for me except Harry and he doesn't really want to stay still for me a lot recently because he has his friends he likes to be with and things he has to do." Neville nodded his understanding before saying in a thoughtful tone

"I'll do it." Roselyn blinked in surprise

"Really?" she asked doubtfully. Neville nodded, the look of sincerity on his face convincing her. She smiled a big smiled and hugged him excitedly

"Oh thank you Neville! Can we try now?" Neville smiled and nodded

"Sure! What do you need me to do?" Roselyn smiled and got ready to draw him.

"Just sit there and talk to me, but don't move too much." Neville nodded and Roselyn started to draw him.

"Do you like being in Ravenclaw?" Roselyn smiled brightly.

"For the most part. Their all really nice except when it comes to Luna Lovegood. They like to pick on her because she's kind of strange. What about you? Do you like Gryffindor?" Neville shrugged and smiled

"Yes, I'm not very brave though, so I'm not entirely sure why the hat put me where it did. But I'm happy because my parents were both in Gryffindor." Roselyn nodded as she continued to shade her picture.

"I don't really know what house my parents were in. but I do know that they were head boy and girl, so I'm hoping to be a head when I get to seventh year." Neville smiled

"I bet you will get it." Roselyn smiled gratefully

"Thanks. Alright, I'm done, wanna see?" she asked. Neville nodded enthusiastically so Roselyn handed him the drawing. He looked at it for a moment before smiling and handing it back

"It's good. Not as good as your scenery pictures, but defiantly close." Roselyn scoffed, but Neville knew she wasn't upset because she was trying not to smile

"I don't think so, your nose is all funny in this picture and your mouth is strange looking too." Neville tried to stifle a laugh

"So? Then work on noses and mouths for a while. Anyways, I need to be going. thanks for helping me with my homework." Roselyn nodded and stood up too.

"No prob. Lets do this every Saturday at one ok? And thanks for being my test subject for my drawing." Neville nodded, agreeing to meet on Saturdays and they parted ways. Roselyn wandered around for a little before finally deciding to head back to her common room. When she knocked the Eagle head asked

"Always wax, yet always wane: I melt, succumbed to the flame. Lighting darkness, with fate unblest, I soon devolve to shapeless mess." Roselyn frowned a moment, thinking it over

"Hmm, a candle is always wax but always wanes, when you light it, it melts. It also lights the darkness and melts into a shapeless mess the longer its lit sooo, a candle." She said

"Well reasoned." Responded the eagle before the door opened. Roselyn walked up to her dorm got ready for the night, not realizing that the next day would be the start of a downhill slope for her year at school.

Halloween day passed in a flurry for Roselyn, she spent the time doing homework and looking for Ginny, whom she couldn't seem to find, so she stayed with Astoria, and Luna. They spent their time trying to find secret passage ways until dinner where they split ways, Astoria heading to the Slythrin table and Luna and Roselyn going to the Ravenclaw table.

Roselyn enjoyed the feast, the dancing skeletons were fun to watch and the food was amazing. Roselyn looked around and frowned when she didn't see Ginny, she turned to Luna and asked

"What do you think is wrong with Ginny? I haven't seen her all day." Luna looked over to the Gryffindor table and frowned slightly, looking quite unlike herself.

"I don't know, she's been slightly off color lately so she could just be sick." Roselyn nodded, unconvinced. She didn't worry about it again until the Great Hall started emptying out and everyone started to go back to her dorms. She and Luna were just about to split off from everyone when everyone went silent. Roselyn and Luna were small enough that they were able to duck under people to see what was happening.

Harry, Ron, and Hermione were standing in the middle of the Hall next to Filchs cat who was hanging by her tail with the words 'The Chamber of Secrets has been open. Enemies of the Heir beware.' Next to it.

Roselyn's blood ran cold. Suddenly someone shouted through the quiet.

"Enemies of the Heir, beware! You'll be next, Mudbloods!"

It was Draco Malfoy.

He had pushed to the front of the crowd, his cold eyes alive, his usually bloodless face flushed, as he grinned at the sight of the hanging, immobile cat.


	9. Chapter 9

**Disclaimer: Harry Potter is not mine. Rose is.**

**A/N: sorry it took so long to post. hope this is ok. might change some.**

**Chapter 10: Writing on the wall**

"What's going on here? What's going on?"

Attracted no doubt by Malfoy's shout, Argus Filch came shouldering his way through the crowd. Then he saw Mrs. Norris and fell back, clutching his face in horror.

"My cat! My cat! What's happened to Mrs. Norris?" he shrieked.

And his popping eyes fell on Harry.

"You!" he screeched. "You! You've murdered my cat! You've killed her! I'll kill you! I'll —"

"Argus!"

Dumbledore had arrived on the scene, followed by a number of other teachers. In seconds, he had swept past Harry, Ron, and Hermione and detached Mrs. Norris from the torch bracket.

"Come with me, Argus," he said to Filch. "You, too, Mr. Potter, Mr. Weasley, Miss Granger."

Lockhart stepped forward eagerly.

"My office is nearest, Headmaster — just upstairs — please feel free —"

"Thank you, Gilderoy," said Dumbledore.

The silent crowd parted to let them pass. Lockhart, looking excited and important, hurried after

Dumbledore; so did Professors McGonagall and Snape. Roselyn caught Harry's eye and tried to give him an encouraging smile, but it came out more like a wince. Harry nodded back but Roselyn could tell he wasn't reassured at all. In fact, all three of them looked ill and slightly panicky.

"Alright, move along! Back to your dorms! There's nothing for you to see here." Came the squeaky voice of Professor Flitwick. Slowly, students started to file out of the Hallway, a hushed murmur of voices as people tried to figure out what was happening. Roselyn came up to Professor Flitwick and asked

"Professor? Is Harry going to be in trouble?" Professor Flitwick looked unsure and uneasy.

"I'm sure he'll be fine Miss. Potter. Go back to the dorm, you'll find out in the morning I'm sure." Roselyn nodded slowly and looked apprehensively at the message before turning and finding Luna before heading up to their common room. When the two girls got up into their dorm room they were ambushed by Callie Trent, Tessa Herring, and Sheila Guthrie.

"Roselyn! What did your brother do? What's happening?" They asked. Roselyn looked uneasily to Luna who was already getting ready for bed before looking back at the three girls.

"Harry didn't do anything, he was just in the wrong spot at the wrong time and I'm not entirely sure what's happening." Roselyn said, hoping it was true rather than knowing it was true. Callie huffed and tossed her curly chocolaty hair over her shoulder.

"Whatever, I want to know who did that to Mrs. Noris. I bet she was killed because she caught someone out of bounds." Tessa and Sheila both nodded their agreement. Roselyn looked between the three girls with a frown on her face.

The three girls were all gossips and all cared about how they looked. Even when they were going to bed they all were wearing really nice pajama's and had their hair all nicely brushed.

Callie was definitely the leader of the trio and whatever she said went. Even after only being here for a month she had made sure to get right in with all the gossip.

Roselyn sighed and left the three to their girl talk as she got ready for bed. She was worried that Harry, Ron and Hermione were going to be expelled and she wanted to know what the Chamber of secrets was and what happened to Mrs. Noris. She laid down and after wishing Luna a good night she proceeded to dream of blood and wide eyed dead bodies of her brother and friends.

For a few days, the school could talk of little else but the attack on Mrs. Norris. Filch kept it fresh in everyone's minds by pacing the spot where she had been attacked, as though he thought the attacker might come back. Roselyn had seen him scrubbing the message on the wall with Mrs. Skower's All-Purpose Magical Mess Remover, but to no effect; the words still gleamed as brightly as ever on the stone.

When Filch wasn't guarding the scene of the crime, he was skulking red-eyed through the corridors, lunging out at unsuspecting students and trying to put them in detention for things like "breathing loudly' and "looking happy."

Ginny had also seemed very disturbed by Mrs. Norris's fate. Roselyn knew that she was a huge cat lover.

"But you haven't really got to know Mrs. Norris," Ron told her bracingly. "Honestly, we're much better off without her." Ginny's lip trembled. "Stuff like this doesn't often happen at Hogwarts," Ron assured her. "They'll catch the maniac who did it and have him out of here in no time. I just hope he's got time to Petrify Filch before he's expelled. I'm only joking —" Ron added hastily as Ginny blanched, Roselyn had hit Ron over the head for that one. She felt immensely sorry for Mrs. Noris as she was also somewhat of a cat lover but she thought Ginny was a little too upset. Roselyn swore to keep an eye on her friend, because she was worrying her.

To Roselyn's surprise, many people (Mostly Ravenclaws) were now spending a lot of time in the Library reading. While that wasn't unusual for some people, the sheer amount of people in the library was strange. Roselyn herself was able to avoid the library only because she had read up on the Chamber in her own copy of Hogwarts, A History. She wasn't surprised that one of the founders had been biased, though she did think that maybe he was biased against only muggles and not muggle-borns simply because of the time that he came from, any witch or wizard of any background would have been persecuted, but she didn't know for certain because she only had one book to go off of. What she wanted to know was what the monster in the chamber was. She wouldn't be able to do any more research until she had more facts though.

Roselyn also found quite a bit of her time trying to squash the rumors that had started about her brother being the heir of Slytherin. She became very upset when people started skirting around him and simply because she was his sister, her as well. She was grateful to find that her friends, Astoria, Luna, Ginny, Colin and Neville didn't seem to care either way, and that made her feel much better.

In fact she had nearly forgotten about it all until Colin had come up to her one day and asked if it was true that Harry really was Slytherins Heir. She had snapped at him at the time, telling him not to be stupid before then thinking about how she could go about proving it.

"Why don't you just ask a professor?" Astoria asked one day during potions as they continued to try and finish their potion.

"But what professor? I don't think any of them really do anything with genealogy." Roselyn frowned before saying "We need a bit more lacewing, the potions looking a little too yellow instead of green." Astoria frowned and checked her potions book before shrugging and following Roselyn's instruction.

"They may not have anything to do with it but they could probably point you in the right direction." Roselyn huffed but nodded. Anything to stay away from Madam Pince who creeped her out with how possessive she was of the library books. Soon Professor Snape started to stalk around the room and check the potions, sneering at some of the potions while nodding in reluctant approval to others. When he came over to Roselyn and Astoria's potion he raised an eyebrow at the potion. It was the only one in the room that didn't look watered down.

"Perfect potion. 5 points to Ravenclaw and Slytherin." Roselyn and Astoria beamed at each other and high fived before Snape dismissed the class. Roselyn waved Luna and Astoria on and went up to Professor Snapes desk.

"Professor?" He looked up and raised an eyebrow.

"Yes Miss. Potter?" Roselyn paused before soldering on.

"I was curious to know if you knew, where I could go to in order to trace my lineage from my dads side, since I doubt I could find any on mums side." She watched apprehensively as the Professors face darkened before quickly clearing. He leaned back and studied her for a moment.

"Have you not asked Madam Pince? She should be able to direct you to some books." Roselyn blushed and looked down sheepishly

"She gives me the creeps." She muttered. Professor Snape's eyebrow rose and he looked somewhat amused before he grabbed a quill and parchment and scribbled something down while saying

"I highly doubt anything would be in the library. You could write to the department of magical genealogy if you want to know more than just who your parents were." He handed her the paper that had the department name and the head of the department's name. Roselyn beamed at him

"Thank you sir!" he just nodded and watched as she spun around and raced out the door to where Luna and Astoria were waiting.

"Did he tell you?" Astoria asked. Roselyn nodded and looked down at the parchment again

"Yes. He told me to contact Gena Olgery in the Department of magical geneology about my questions." Luna nodded

"Mrs. Olgery is quite nice. She's friends with daddy." Roselyn nodded gratefully as they made their way down the hall to their next class.

After classes were over, Roselyn was surprised when Harry hunted her down.

"Rose! Come here real quick." Roselyn blinked in surprise and looked over to where Harry was gesturing her over into an empty classroom. She went over to him and was unsurprised to see Ron and Hermione there too.

"What is it? What's going on?" she asked. Ron and Harry looked worried and resigned while Hermione just looked determined. Harry sighed and started to explain.

"We want to know who the Heir of Slytherin is. Hermione knows of a potion that we can use and we wanted to know if you would help us make it since you are doing so well in potions." Roselyn blinked and frowned.

"Who do you think is the Heir? And what potion?" Harry hesitated before continuing

"We think Malfoy might know who it is. But obviously he won't tell us so Hermione knows a potion that we could use to turn ourselves into some Slytherins." Roselyn looked at them in disbelief.

"Why in the world do you think Malfoy is the Heir. Somehow I highly doubt it is." Ron scoffed

"Come on Rose, his whole family has been in Slytherin and his father's evil enough. It's not a long shot that they had the key for centuries, handing it down Father to Son." Ron reasoned. Roselyn looked at him

"Your whole family's been in Gryffindor, that doesn't mean you're the Heir to Gryffindor. And what's this Potion that you want me to work on?" Hermione jumped in this time

"Polyjuice potion." Roselyn frowned as she tried to think if she had heard of it before shaking her head.

"Never heard of it. I'll tell you what. You show me the instructions for the potion and I'll consider making it. But I won't be held accountable if you get into trouble for anything and I defiantly won't help you with the interrogation." Harry nodded, probably having expected that. Roselyn groaned, "I can't believe I'm helping you." Harry grinned

"Thanks Rose. We'll talk to you as soon as we find the book okay?" Roselyn nodded and gave him a hug.

"Okay, I have a letter I have to write. Talk to you guys later." Roselyn then left the trio to talk amongst them. She decided to head to the library to write a letter to the Head of the Department of Magical Genealogy.


	10. Chapter 10

**Disclaimer: I do not own anything Harry Potter related except for Roselyn **

**A/N: Hope you enjoy, was a little skewed this week so not sure how the chapter will turn out**

Chapter 10: The Rogue Bludger

To Roselyns extreme dismay, Professor Lockhart's lessons did not improve. After the fiasco in his second year class – that Harry had been in and told her about- he had refrained from bringing in any creatures to class. Something that had been amazingly intelligent on his part, in Roselyn's opinion. Instead, he read passages from his books to them, and sometimes reenacted some of the more dramatic bits.

On the rare occasion he would try to teach them a spell or two which always turned out to be quite the disaster. Despite the fact that the class consisted of Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs, he was unable to actually teach any of the spells to them. Roselyn had become so fed up with this that she had decided to practice on her own in an empty classroom with some old defense books from the library. She had checked them out and read them thoroughly before trying to put the spells she came across to use by practicing them. When she had troubles she would in list one of her friends to help.

She had also gotten a few flying lessons under her belt. While she was not the excellent flyer that everyone said that Harry was, she knew that with some practice she could be a fair flyer. Despite her initial fears of flying, once she was actually up in the air they all seemed to disappear and she enjoyed the feeling of the wind in her hair, though she felt that she was not insane enough to want to play a sport on the broom.

To Roselyn's slight disappointment and apprehension, several days after they had approached her about it, Harry and his friends had gotten ahold of the Moste Potente potions book that apparently had the Polyjuice potion in it. They had grabbed Roselyn away from Ginny, who she had been trying to convince to go out to the lake with her to draw some like they had that summer, and dragged her to Moaning Myrtle's bathroom.

Hermione had overridden Ron's objections by pointing out that it was the last place anyone in their right minds would go, so they were guaranteed some privacy. Moaning Myrtle was crying noisily in her stall, but they were ignoring her, and she them.

Hermione opened Moste Potente Potions carefully, and the four of them bent over the damp-spotted pages. It was clear from a glance why it belonged in the Restricted Section. Some of the potions had effects almost too gruesome to think about, and there were some very unpleasant illustrations, which included a man who seemed to have been turned inside out and a witch sprouting several extra pairs of arms out of her head.

"Here it is," said Hermione excitedly as she found the page headed The Polyjuice Potion. It was decorated with drawings of people halfway through transforming into other people. Just looking at the looks of intense pain on the painted faces made Roelyn glad that she was not taking the potion herself

"This is the most complicated potion I've ever seen," said Hermione as they scanned the recipe. As Roselyn looked over her shoulder she had to agree.

"Lacewing flies, leeches, fluxweed, and knotgrass," she murmured, running her finger down the list of ingredients. "Well, they're easy enough, they're in the student store-cupboard, we can help ourselves… Oooh, look, powdered horn of a bicorn — don't know where we're going to get that — shredded skin of a boomslang — that'll be tricky, too and of course a bit of whoever we want to change into."

"Excuse me?" said Ron sharply. "What d'you mean, a bit of whoever we're changing into? I'm drinking nothing with Crabbe's toenails in it —"

Hermione continued as though she hadn't heard him so Roselyn leaned over and whispered

"Don't worry, it means a strand of hair or something."

"We don't have to worry about that yet, though, because we add those bits last…"

Ron turned, speechless, to Harry, who had another worry.

"D'you realize how much we're going to have to steal, Hermione? Shredded skin of a boomslang, that's definitely not in the students' cupboard. What're we going to do, break into Snape's private stores? I don't know if this is a good idea…"

Hermione shut the book with a snap.

"Well, if you two are going to chicken out, fine," she said. There were bright pink patches on her cheeks and her eyes were brighter than usual. "I don't want to break rules, you know. I think threatening Muggle-borns is far worse than brewing up a difficult potion. But if you don't want to find out if it's Malfoy, I'll go straight to Madam Pince now and hand the book back in.'

"I never thought I'd see the day when you'd be persuading us to break rules," said Ron. "All right, we'll do it. But not toenails, okay?"

"How long will it take to make, anyway?" said Harry as Hermione, looking happier, opened the book again. Roselyn looked at the trio in disbelief, she could not imagine that they were willing to steal stuff for this.

"Well, since the fluxweed has got to be picked at the full moon and the lacewings have got to be stewed for twenty-one days… I'd say it'd be ready in about a month, if we can get all the ingredients."

"A month?" said Ron. "Malfoy could have attacked half the Muggle-borns in the school by then!" But Hermione's eyes narrowed dangerously again, and he added swiftly, "But it's the best plan we've got, so full steam ahead, I say." Harry turned to Roselyn and asked

"Is their anyway you can get the ingredients? You said that Snape liked you well enough." Roselyn shook her head with a frown on her face.

"I could, but he probably would want to know why I want it. He would probably recognize what potions the ingredients went to."

However, while Hermione was checking that the coast was clear for them to leave the bathroom, Ron muttered to Harry, "It'll be a lot less hassle if you can just knock Malfoy off his broom tomorrow." Roselyn giggled before taking off to go find Ginny once more.

Unsurprisingly, Roselyn found Ginny tucked away in a corner of the Library writing in her diary again.

"Ginny! So, now that I've escaped from our brothers and Hermione, we should really go walk around the lake." She said, plopping down into the chair across from Ginny. The other girl started almost violently and slammed her diary shut and looked up at Roselyn with a disgruntled frown.

"Don't do that!" She snapped as she quickly hid the diary from sight. Roselyn frowned at her.

"Well I'm sorry! Your acting like I was trying to read over your shoulder or something. I just wanted to hang out with you." She said back. Ginny blinked and took a breath before saying.

"I'm sorry Rose. You just startled me. I would like to go for a walk with you." Roselyn eyed the other girl closely before nodding, forgiving her without saying it and standing up.

"Well, lets go then. I really think you need to get out more, it might help you feel better." She told Ginny, eyeing the other girls pale complextion. Ginny looked briefly annoyed before sighing and nodding.

"You're probably right. Come on." She agreed. Thankfully it didn't take long for Ginny to snap out of her mood and was soon laughing and joking around with Roselyn.

Roselyn woke up early on Saturday morning, buzzing with excitement. She was excited to see her first Quidditch game. She was even more excited to finally see her brother fly. She got up and went about getting ready for the day. She was dressing in gold and red to support her brother since he wasn't playing Ravenclaw and she put her hair back into a bun with gold ribbon's hanging from it. Afterwards she turned and helped braid red ribbons into Luna's hair before they left for breakfast.

When the girls got to the great hall, Roselyn immediately located her brother and went to wish him and his team good luck. She found them sitting at the Gryffindor table, all looking uptight and not speaking much.

"Harry!" Harry looked up and over to her. Roselyn could see that he was looking a little green.

"Hey Rose." He said. she smiled reassuringly at him.

"Cheer up Harry. I have no doubt you'll win today's match. Fast brooms doesn't make a team. And anyways, I'll be cheering you all on." Harry smiled gratefully

"Thanks Rose. I see your all decked out in Gryffindor colors." Roselyn nodded

"Of course. I have to cheer my brother on. Anyways, I'll probably see you after the match." She then turned to address the rest of the team, "Good luck everybody." All she got were murmurs of thanks before she turned to go eat.

As eleven o'clock approached, the whole school started to make its way down to the Quidditch stadium. It was a muggy sort of day with a hint of thunder in the air. Ron and Hermione came hurrying over to wish Harry good luck as he entered the locker rooms before going up to join Roselyn and Ginny in the stands. They watched with bated breath as the teams walked out onto the pitch, a roar of noise greeting them; mainly cheers, because Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff were anxious to see Slytherin beaten, but the Slytherins in the crowd made their boos and hisses heard, too. Madam Hooch, the Quidditch teacher, asked Flint and Wood to shake hands, which they did, giving each other threatening stares and gripping rather harder than was necessary.

"On my whistle," said Madam Hooch. "Three… two… one…"

With a roar from the crowd to speed them upward, the fourteen players rose toward the leaden sky. Harry flew higher than any of them, squinting around for the Snitch. Roselyn watched with wide eyes as the game started. She saw Malfoy say something to Harry that couldn't be heard before a heavy black Bludger came pelting toward him; he avoided it so narrowly that Roselyn feared for a moment it might take his head off.

George flew past him with his club ready to knock the Bludger back toward a Slytherin. However, when he gave the ball a powerful whack in the direction of Adrian Pucey it changed direction in midair and shot straight for Harry again

Harry dropped quickly to avoid it, and George managed to hit it hard toward Malfoy. Once again, the Bludger swerved like a boomerang and shot at Harry's head. Roselyn's heart leapt up into her throat as she leant over to Ginny and asked

"Is that supposed to happen." Ginny only shook her head as she watched Harry apprehensively. Roselyn turned her gaze back to Harry to see him put on a burst of speed and zoom toward the other end of the pitch. The Bludger whistling along behind him.

Fred was waiting for the Bludger at the other end. Harry ducked as Fred swung at the Bludger with all his might; the Bludger was knocked off course. Roselyn cheered, glad that the insane ball wasn't after him before squeaking; as though it was magnetically attracted to Harry, the Bludger pelted after him once more and Harry was forced to fly off at full speed.

It had started to rain; Roselyn felt heavy drops fall onto her face, and she began to feel even more apprehensive. Not only was a rogue Bludger after her brother but now it was raining.

"He wont be able to see!" She said anxiously as Lee Jordan, who was commentating, said, "Slytherin lead, sixty points to zero.'

The Slytherins' superior brooms were clearly doing their jobs, and meanwhile the mad Bludger was doing all it could to knock Harry out of the air. Fred and George were now flying so close to him on either side that it would be a miracle if Harry could see anything at all except their flailing arms and had no chance to look for the Snitch, let alone catch it.

Soon George was able to signal to Wood for a time out between trying to stop the Bludger from breaking Harry's nose

Wood had obviously got the message. Madam Hooch's whistle rang out and Harry, Fred, and George dived for the ground, still trying to avoid the mad Bludger. The teams all landed and Roselyn could see the Gryffindor team talking animatedly.

"They'll stop the game wont they? I mean, the Bludgers tampered with so they have to right?" She asked anxiously. Hermione shook her head,

"They'll only stop it if one of the captains call a forfeit. Neither team will do that though." Roselyn swallowed anxiously and watched as Madam Hooch started the game again.

The rain was falling more heavily now. On Madam Hooch's whistle, Harry kicked hard into the air and immediately the Bludger was after him again. Higher and higher Harry climbed; he looped and swooped, spiraled, zigzagged, and rolled. Roselyn clasped her hands together and prayed that Harry would be okay while trying to tune out the laughing from the crowd. She did not think there was anything funny with Harry trying to avoid the Bludger.

Soon she could see Malfoy talking to Harry again and wondered why her brother had stopped to stare at Malfoy. Roselyn winced when she saw and heard the Bludger make contact with Harry's arm. She could even hear his bone shatter.

The Bludger came pelting back for a second attack, this time zooming at his face — Harry swerved out of the way, before he dived for the shimmering, sneering face below him and Roselyn thought for a second that Harry was going to attack him before she saw what Harry was doing. He had seen the snitch. She held her breath in anticipation as Harry took his remaining hand off his broom and made a wild snatch; Roselyn saw his fingers close on the cold Snitch and cheered excitedly, but was now only gripping the broom with his legs, and there was a yell from the crowd below as he headed straight for the ground.

With a splattering thud he hit the mud and rolled off his broom. His arm was hanging at a very strange angle; Roselyn screamed and ran down to the field with Ginny, Ron, and Hermione close behind her.

When she finally came up to him she saw that he had fainted. But she also saw with growing dread that Lockheart was there, leaning over him. She ran up and kneeled next to him.

"Harry? Harry!" She called as she shook him slightly. He came around and immediately his gaze fell on Lockheart who was leaning over him with a smile on his face, though what he was smiling about Roselyn didn't know.

"Oh, no, not you," he moaned. Roselyn nodded in agreement.

"Doesn't know what he's saying," said Lockhart loudly to the anxious crowd of Gryffindors pressing around them. "Not to worry, Harry. I'm about to fix your arm."

"No!" said Harry. "I'll keep it like this, thanks…" He tried to sit up, but the pain was obviously terrible. Roselyn could hear a familiar clicking noise nearby.

"I don't want a photo of this, Colin," he said loudly.

"Lie back, Harry," said Lockhart soothingly. "It's a simple charm I've used countless times —"

"Why can't I just go to the hospital wing?" said Harry through clenched teeth. Roselyna nodded and tried to push Lockheart away but he stayed firm.

"He should really, Professor," said a muddy Wood, who couldn't help grinning even though his Seeker was injured. "Great capture, Harry, really spectacular, your best yet, I'd say —"

"Stand back," said Lockhart, who was rolling up his jade-green sleeves. Roselyn gasped, horrified, and tried to stop him, but Ron quickly grabbed her and pulled her out of the way.

"No — don't —" said Harry weakly, but Lockhart was twirling his wand and a second later had directed it straight at Harry's arm. Roselyn gasped and felt sick as she watched her brothers arm deflate and look more like rubber than an arm. The crowd gasped and Colin Creevey began clicking away madly.

"Ah," said Lockhart. "Yes. Well, that can sometimes happen. But the point is, the bones are no longer broken. That's the thing to bear in mind. So, Harry, just toddle up to the hospital wing — ah, Mr. Weasley, Miss Granger, Miss. Potter, would you escort him? — and Madam Pomfrey will be able to — er — tidy you up a bit."

Roselyn wiggled out of Rons grasp and helped Harry up, seeing as how he looked as though he was about to pass out again after having caught sight of his arm.

"Come on Harry, lets get you to Madam Pomfrey." Roselyn muttered, walking beside him up to the Hospital wing. On her way she turned to Ron with an unhappy look,

"Why didn't you let me stop him?" Ron looked at her in disbelief

"He wasn't stopping! Who knows what would have happened if he hit something random on you? Or if he misfired and hit Harry's head instead." Roselyn paused as the gruesome image of her brothers deflated head or her torso entered her head and she had to keep from being sick.

"Right, thanks then." She muttered. Ron just nodded as they all continued to the Hospital wing.

Madam Pomfrey wasn't at all pleased.

"You should have come straight to me!" she raged, holding up the sad, limp remainder of what, half an hour before, had been a working arm. "I can mend bones in a second — but growing them back —"

"You will be able to, won't you?" said Harry desperately.

"I'll be able to, certainly, but it will be painful," said Madam Pomfrey grimly, throwing Harry a pair of pyjamas. "You'll have to stay the night…"

Hermione and Rosleyn waited outside the curtain drawn around Harry's bed while Ron helped him into his pyjamas.

"If Harry had wanted deboning he would have asked."

"How can you stick up for Lockhart now, Hermione, eh?" Ron called through the curtain as he pulled "Anyone can make a mistake," said Hermione. "And it doesn't hurt anymore, does it, Harry?"

"No," said Harry, getting into bed. "But it doesn't do anything else either."

As he swung himself onto the bed, his arm flapped pointlessly. Roselyn winced and glared at Hermione. She couldn't believe that she was still sticking up for the git.

Hermione, Roselyn, and Madam Pomfrey came around the curtain. Madam Pomfrey was holding a large bottle of something labeled Skele-Gro.

"You're in for a rough night," she said, pouring out a steaming beakerful and handing it to him. "Regrowing bones is a nasty business."

So was taking the Skele-Gro apparently, because Harry coughed and spluttered as he tried to choke it down. Still tut-tutting about dangerous sports and inept teachers, Madam Pomfrey retreated, leaving Rosleyn, Ron and Hermione to help Harry gulp down some water. "We won, though," said Ron, a grin breaking across his face. "That was some catch you made. Malfoy's face… he looked ready to kill…"

"I want to know how he fixed that Bludger," said Hermione darkly. Roselyn frowned and kept from pointing out that a second year wouldn't be able to fix the Bludger but knew that she would be ignored.

"We can add that to the list of questions we'll ask him when we've taken the Polyjuice Potion," said Harry, sinking back onto his pillows. "I hope it tastes better than this stuff…"

"If it's got bits of Slytherins in it? You've got to be joking," said Ron.

The door of the hospital wing burst open at that moment. Filthy and soaking wet, the rest of the Gryffindor team had arrived to see Harry. "Unbelievable flying, Harry," said George. "I've just seen Marcus Flint yelling at Malfoy. Something about having the Snitch on top of his head and not noticing. Malfoy didn't seem too happy."

They had brought cakes, sweets, and bottles of pumpkin juice; they gathered around Harry's bed and were just getting started on what promised to be a good party when Madam Pomfrey came storming over, shouting, "This boy needs rest, he's got thirty-three bones to regrow! Out! OUT!" And Roselyn was forced to leave with the rest of the group.

Before she left for the Ravenclaw tower she turned and pulled Ron and Hermione aside

"Did you get the ingredients for the potion?" They nodded and Roselyn chewed on her lip, "I've been studying the potion and I think I can do it. When do you want to start it?" The two looked at each other and Ron shrugged, causing Hermione to look at her uncertainly

"The sooner the better I think. We'll tell you when we're going to start it okay?" Roselyn nodded and went up to bed. Wondering who could have fixed the Bludger. When she got to her dorm, she assured Luna that Harry was alright before getting ready to do her homework and go to bed.

In the morning, as soon as Roselyn and Luna entered the Great hall, Ginny walked over to them, she was pale and jittery.

"Did you hear?" She asked them. The two girls looked at her bewildered.

"Hear what?" Roselyn asked. Ginny took a deep breath,

"Collin was attacked last night. Apparently he was trying to sneak down to see your brother Rose, and he was petrified!" Ginny was wringing her hands, looking so visibly upset that Roselyn began to wonder if she had become closer friends to Colin than she origionally thought.

"I hope they catch the culprit soon." Luna said with a worried frown. "I sent a letter to daddy and he said he would try to figure out what kind of animal it was, but no luck so far." Roselyn and Ginny traded looks, both slightly skeptical of what her father would come up with but relieved that the adults cared none the less.

Just then Ron and Hermione came running up to her, grabbed her arms and started to pull her away, calling

"We have to borrow Rose real quick! Bye!" Over their shoulders.

"Woah! What's going on? I was going to eat." Ron shook his head.

"We're going to start that potion now. It's the best time now that Colin has been attacked. We want this to get done as soon as possible." They then dragged her into Moaning Myrtles bathroom to start.


	11. Chapter 11

**Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter! If I did, not nearly as many people would read it. I do own Roselyn though.**

**AN: So i've managed to update the story and fix some things. For one, I took out Kara because what I wanted to do with her wasn't going to work in this ficlet, also i fixed chapter 10 because for some reason I skipped from chapter 9 to chapter 14 and compleatly confused myself! so hopefully this is much better. please read and review!**

Chapter 11: The Dueling Club

Somehow, Roselyn, Ron, and Hermione all managed to fit into one of the stalls in Moaning Myrtles bathroom. Hermione had cast her signature blue bell fire onto the toilet seat where they had placed the cauldron. Roselyn managed to do a nifty little charm to make the book float in the air over the cauldron so that she could read it without having to consult Hermione or Ron or without having to constantly look down at it.

"Alright, I'm going to give you directions and you each have to do them." She gave a look to Ron, "EXACTLY as I tell you to." Ron rolled his eyes but nodded. Roselyn nodded and turned to the book.

"Okay, you picked the fluxweed at the full moon correct?" She asked Hermione. Hermione nodded

"Yes, but it's not the full moon today, so we can't add it." Roselyn frowned

"I asked Professor Snape about that-" Before she was able to finish the two gasped and she looked at them startled, "what? What!"

"Why'd you ask him? Is he suspicious?" Roselyn looked at them, offended,

"What d'you take me for? I asked about things in general, if you have to pick an ingredient at a certain time of the month, do you have to add it the same time or can it be whenever. He told me that unless the potion specifically asks for you to add said ingredient at a certain time of the month then it doesn't matter as long as you pick the ingredient at the correct time." Hermione was nodding her understanding while Ron just looked confused. Roselyn rolled her eyes. "Anyways, Hermione, measure out three measures of fluxweed and hold onto it. Ron grab two bundles of knotgrass." She waited as the two did as she asked. She nodded "alright, Hermione you add yours first, then Ron, you second." They did as told and Roselyn picked up the stir spoon and stirred clockwise three times before putting the spoon down. She checked the book and nodded

"Okay, now we need to let it brew for eighty minutes." Ron groaned

"Are we seriously going to wait here for an hour and twenty mintues?" Hermione glared at him, but Roselyn shrugged.

"You are more than welcome to do as you wish, but I at least need to be here to keep an eye on the potion." Before Ron could hop up and scuttle out, there was a quiet knock on the stall door. The three of them froze and looked at each other wide eyed before Harrys voice made its way to them.

"It's me," he said, closing the bathroom door behind him. There was a clunk, and a gasp as Hermione's suddenly moved, dropping the bag of ingredients to the ground so she could peer through the keyhole.

"Harry!" she said. "You gave us such a fright — come in. How's your arm?"

"Fine," said Harry, squeezing into the stall. Roselyn grumbled as she was squished even closer to the toilet and cauldron.

"We'd've come to meet you, but we decided to get started on the Polyjuice Potion," Ron explained as Harry, with difficulty, locked the stall again. "We've decided this is the safest place to hide it."

Harry started to tell them about Colin, but Hermione interrupted.

"We already know — we heard Professor McGonagall telling Professor Flitwick this morning. That's why we decided we'd better get going —"

"And I heard from Ginny." Roselyn piped in.

"The sooner we get a confession out of Malfoy, the better," snarled Ron. "D'you know what I think? He was in such a foul temper after the Quidditch match, he took it out on Colin." Roselyn once again rolled her eyes, she still didn't think it was him, despite as much of a git as he was.

"There's something else," said Harry "Dobby came to visit me in the middle of the night."

Roselyn, Ron and Hermione looked up, amazed. Harry told them everything Dobby had told him — or hadn't told him. Hermione and Ron listened with their mouths open. Roselyn nodded, she'd guessed as much.

"The Chamber of Secrets has been opened before?" Hermione said.

"This settles it," said Ron in a triumphant voice. "Lucius Malfoy must've opened the Chamber when he was at school here and now he's told dear old Draco how to do it. It's obvious. Wish Dobby'd told you what kind of monster's in there, though. I want to know how come nobody's noticed it sneaking around the school." Roselyn didn't even have time to point out that Malfoy sr. wasn't old enough to have attended the school fifty years ago, but Hermione started talking, so she looked at her watch and decided to add the leaches

"Maybe it can make itself invisible," said Hermione, as she crushed the lacewing to add. "Or maybe it can disguise itself — pretend to be a suit of armor or something — I've read about Chameleon Ghouls —"

"You read too much, Hermione," said Ron, Roselyn rolled her eyes,

"Chamelion Ghouls cant petrify their victims Hermione." She said, pouring the dead lacewings on top of the leeches. Ron crumpled up the empty lacewing bag and looked at Harry.

"So Dobby stopped us from getting on the train and broke your arm." He shook his head. "You know what, Harry? If he doesn't stop trying to save your life he's going to kill you."

"Ron's right. You need to be careful Harry. Who knows what Dobby could think up next." Roselyn agreed.

The news that Colin Creevey had been attacked and was now lying as though dead in the hospital wing had spread through the entire school by Monday morning. The air was suddenly thick with rumor and suspicion. Most of the first years were now moving around the castle in tight-knit groups, as though scared they would be attacked if they ventured forth alone.

Ginny, was distraught, but to Roselyn's horror Fred and George were going the wrong way about cheering her up. They were taking turns covering themselves with fur or boils and jumping out at her from behind statues. They only stopped when Percy, apoplectic with rage, told them he was going to write to Mrs. Weasley and tell her Ginny was having nightmares.

Meanwhile, hidden from the teachers, a roaring trade in talismans, amulets, and other protective devices was sweeping the school. Neville bought a large, evil-smelling green onion, a pointed purple crystal, and a rotting newt tail before Roselyn pointed out that he was in no danger; he was a pure-blood, and therefore unlikely to be attacked.

"They went for Filch first," Neville said, his round face fearful. "And everyone knows I'm almost a Squib." Roselyn scoffed at this.

"You are not almost a squib Neville. You either are one, or your not. You just haven't completely developed your magic. Once you become more confident you'll improve." She told him confidently, getting a thankful look from the boy.

In the second week of December Professor McGonagall came around as usual, collecting names of those who would be staying at school for Christmas. Harry, Ron, and Hermione signed her list; they had heard that Malfoy was staying, which struck them as very suspicious. The holidays would be the perfect time to use the Polyjuice Potion and try to worm a confession out of him. Roselyn signed up just because she didn't want to go back to the Dursleys, and though she was disappointed to find that Astoria and Luna were both going home, she was glad to find that Ginny was staying. And with a bit of pleading to Professor Mcgonagall and Professor Flitwick, She was going to be allowed to stay in the Gryffindor girls dorm with Ginny over break, which excited both girls.

Unfortunately, the potion was only half finished. They still needed the bicorn horn and the boomslang skin, and the only place they were going to get them was from Snape's private stores. Roselyn was privately very glad that she didn't have to rob Professor Snape, despite the fact that he liked her, she had a healthy fear of his temper.

While Harry, Ron, and Hermione were devising to get the ingredients during their double potions class, Roselyn was talking to Ginny in their Herbology class.

"What do you want to do first?" Roselyn asked as she sprinkled more mooncalf dung on the potted leaping toadstools. Ginny shrugged.

"I dunno, we need to have a snowball fight though." Roselyn nodded

"Alright, we should draw some too. We haven't had a chance to draw together since we got here." Ginny shrugged and nodded.

"Sure." Roselyn frowned and looked thoughtfully at Ginny.

"Hey, are you okay? You've been awfully pale and quiet all year." Ginny just stared determinedly down at the plant she was fertilizing.

"I'm fine. I just…" She trailed off as she looked troubled before shrugging. "I'm just nervous about this whole thing with the chamber and Colin, and I'm a little homesick." She said softly. Roselyn studied her. She got the feeling that Ginny was not telling her the whole truth but let it go. She didn't want to push her. While she knew Ginny was her friend, she didn't know how far she could push before Ginny got upset and pushed her away.

"Well, at least we don't have to put up with Lockheart here soon." That made Ginny smile, and they talked lightheartedly for the rest of the class.

At the end of class, Harry, Ron, and Hermione came bustling up and grabbed her away from Ginny.

"Sorry Gin, we need to borrow Rose for a moment." Ginny looked startled, but nodded as she watched the three of them drag her away. Roselyn thought she could see some jealously cross her face before it was wiped away and a confused smile took its place.

"We have the last of the ingredients." Hermione said as she threw the new ingredients into the cauldron and began to stir feverishly.

"It'll be ready in two weeks," she said happily.

"Snape can't prove it was you," said Ron reassuringly to Harry. "What can he do?"

"Knowing Snape, something foul," said Harry as the potion frothed and bubbled. Roselyn rose an eyebrow, tempted to ask what he did, but then decided that if she didn't know, then she couldn't be questioned about it.

A week later, Roselyn and Astoria were walking across the entrance hall when they saw a small knot of people gathered around the notice board, reading a piece of parchment that had just been pinned up. They looked at each other and silently agreed to go check it out. They got their at the same time as Seamus Finnegin was telling Harry, Ron, and Hermione

"They're starting a Dueling Club!" said Seamus. "First meeting tonight! I wouldn't mind dueling lessons; they might come in handy one of these days…"

"What, you reckon Slytherin's monster can duel?" said Ron, but he, too, read the sign with interest. Astoria and Roselyn exchanged excited looks.

"Ohh, maybe we'll actually learn something!" Roselyn said, excited. "I hear that Professor Flitwick was a dueling champion when he was young so I bet he could do it. Even Professor Snape would be a good teacher, after all, he wanted the DADA position for forever." Astoria rolled her eyes, but smiled at her enthusiasm.

"I'll never understand why you're so eager to learn. But yes, I'm looking forward to learning how to duel, aside from even protecting myself from the monster."

"Who care's about the monster? I just wanna learn something useful for defence. Lets go!" Roselyn said laughing, so at eight o'clock that evening they hurried back to the Great Hall. The long dining tables had vanished and a golden stage had appeared along one wall, lit by thousands of candles floating overhead. The ceiling was velvety black once more and most of the school seemed to be packed beneath it, all carrying their wands and looking excited.

Roselyn looked around as she bounced excitedly on the balls of her feet. Luna, stood to her left with her signature dreamy expression while Astoria stood to her right with a calm façade on her face, though Roselyn could tell by her bright eyes that she was excited. Roselyn looked around and saw Ginny standing over by some other Gryffindor girls and they caught each others gaze and smiled at each other.

"Okay, who is the teacher." Roselyn muttered under her breath. She looked around before groaning, "Oh noooo, not him!" She muttered.

Gilderoy Lockhart was walking onto the stage, resplendent in robes of deep plum and accompanied by none other than Snape, wearing his usual black.

"At least Professor Snape is here, so we might learn something." Astoria whispered to the other two girls.

Lockhart waved an arm for silence and called "Gather round, gather round! Can everyone see me? Can you all hear me? Excellent!

"Now, Professor Dumbledore has granted me permission to start this little dueling club, to train you all in case you ever need to defend yourselves as I myself have done on countless occasions — for full details, see my published works. Let me introduce my assistant, Professor Snape," said Lockhart, flashing a wide smile. "He tells me he knows a tiny little bit about dueling himself and has sportingly agreed to help me with a short demonstration before we begin. Now, I don't want any of you youngsters to worry — you'll still have your Potions master when I'm through with him, never fear!"

"Wouldn't it be good if Professor Snape just demolished Lockheart?" Roselyn muttered as she watched Snape's upper lip curl. Roselyn wondered why Lockhart was still smiling; if Snape had been looking at her like that she'd have been running as fast as she could in the opposite direction.

Lockhart and Snape turned to face each other and bowed; at least, Lockhart did, with much twirling of his hands, whereas Snape jerked his head irritably. Then they raised their wands like swords in front of them.

"As you see, we are holding our wands in the accepted combative position," Lockhart told the silent crowd. "On the count of three, we will cast our first spells. Neither of us will be aiming to kill, of course."

"I wouldn't bet on that," Roselyn murmured, watching Snape baring his teeth.

"One — two — three —"

Both of them swung their wands above their heads and pointed them at their opponent; Snape cried: "Expelliarmus!" There was a dazzling flash of scarlet light and Lockhart was blasted off his feet: He flew backward off the stage, smashed into the wall, and slid down it to sprawl on the floor.

Roselyn silently cheered, but to her chagrin, she saw that Hermione was dancing on tiptoes. "Do you think he's all right?" she squealed through her fingers, the same way that most of the girls were reacting.

She was quite disappointed to see Lockhart was getting unsteadily to his feet. His hat had fallen off and his wavy hair was standing on end.

"Well, there you have it!" he said, tottering back onto the platform. "That was a Disarming Charm — as you see, I've lost my wand — ah, thank you, Miss Brown — yes, an excellent idea to show them that, Professor Snape, but if you don't mind my saying so, it was very obvious what you were about to do. If I had wanted to stop you it would have been only too easy — however, I felt it would be instructive to let them see…"

Snape was looking murderous. Possibly Lockhart had noticed, because he said, "Enough demonstrating! I'm going to come amongst you now and put you all into pairs. Professor Snape, if you'd like to help me —"

They moved through the crowd, matching up partners.

Roselyn was pleased when Professor Snape let her and Astoria stay paired up while Luna was paired with Callie Trent, much to the later girls displeasure.

"Face your partners!" called Lockhart, back on the platform. "And bow!"

Roselyn and Astoria bowed to each other while pointing their wands at each other.

"Wands at the ready!" shouted Lockhart. "When I count to three, cast your charms to disarm your opponents — only to disarm them — we don't want any accidents — one… two… three —"

"Expelliarmus!" The two girls yelled, Roselyn dodged Astoria's spell and was pleased to see that her own spell hit, causing Astoria's wand to jump out of her hand towards Roselyn. Roselyn handed the other girl her spell and looked around. All around them spells were flying around haphazardly.

"Stop! Stop!" screamed Lockhart, but in the end, Snape took charge. "Finite Incantatem!" he shouted; Harry's feet stopped dancing, Malfoy stopped laughing, and they were able to look up.

A haze of greenish smoke was hovering over the scene. Both Neville and Justin were lying on the floor, panting; Ron was holding up an ashen-faced Seamus, apologizing for whatever his broken wand had done; but Hermione and Millicent Bulstrode were still moving; Millicent had Hermione in a headlock and Hermione was whimpering in pain; both their wands lay forgotten on the floor.

Harry leapt forward and somehow managed to pull the much bigger girl off of Hermione.

"Dear, dear," said Lockhart, skittering through the crowd, looking at the aftermath of the duels. "Up you go, Macmillan…"

"Careful there, Miss Fawcett… Pinch it hard, it'll stop bleeding in a second,"

"I think I'd better teach you how to block unfriendly spells," said Lockhart, standing flustered in the midst of the hall. He glanced at Professor Snape, whose black eyes glinted, and looked quickly away. "Let's have a volunteer pair — Longbottom and Finch-Fletchley, how about you —"

"A bad idea, Professor Lockhart," said Professor Snape, gliding over like a large and malevolent bat. "Longbottom causes devastation with the simplest spells. We'll be sending what's left of Finch-Fletchley up to the hospital wing in a matchbox." Neville's round, pink face went pinker. Roselyn pursed her lips together and glared at him. She did not like that comment about her friend, especially not in front of so many students.

"How about Malfoy and Potter?" said Professor Snape with a twisted smile. Roselyn closed her eyes, she just knew this was a bad idea, her thought was proved correct when Lockhart said,

"Excellent idea!" gesturing Harry and Malfoy into the middle of the hall as the crowd backed away to give them room.

"Now, Harry," said Lockhart. "When Draco points his wand at you, you do this."

He raised his own wand, attempted a complicated sort of wiggling action, and dropped it. Snape smirked as Lockhart quickly picked it up, saying, "Whoops— my wand is a little overexcited—"

Snape moved closer to Malfoy, bent down, and whispered something in his ear. Malfoy smirked, too. Amelia saw Harry look up nervously at Lockhart and say, "Professor, could you show me that blocking thing again?"

Lockhart cuffed Harry merrily on the shoulder. "Just do what I did, Harry!"

"What, drop my wand?" But Lockhart wasn't listening. Roselyn took a deep breath and held it as she watched wide eyed.

"Three — two — one — go!" he shouted.

Malfoy raised his wand quickly and bellowed, "Serpensortia!"

The end of his wand exploded. Roselyn watched, aghast, as a long black snake shot out of it, fell heavily onto the floor between the two boys, and raised itself, ready to strike. There were screams as the crowd backed swiftly away, clearing the floor. Astoria was forced to grab ahold of Roselyn to keep her from bolting right then.

"Don't move, Potter," said Snape lazily, clearly enjoying the sight of Harry standing motionless, eye to eye with the angry snake. "I'll get rid of it…"

"Allow me!" shouted Lockhart.

He brandished his wand at the snake and there was a loud bang; the snake, instead of vanishing, flew ten feet into the air and fell back to the floor with a loud smack. Enraged, hissing furiously, it slithered straight toward Justin Finch-Fletchley and raised itself again, fangs exposed, poised to strike.

"Harry!" Roselyn called anxiously, she knew that he had talked to the snake in the zoo the previous year and hoped he would do so again. Roselyn had to fight the sudden urge to run screaming hysterically out of the hall, watching as Harry, as though in a slight trance walked towards the snake and shouted in some sort of hiss. Suddenly the snake slumped to the floor, docile as a thick, black garden hose, its eyes now on Harry. Roselyn sighed in a little relief as she knew the snake wouldn't attack anyone now, she didn't know what Harry said but she was glad for it.

When Harry looked up to Justin, the other boy shouted, "What do you think you're playing at?" and before Harry could say anything, Justin had turned and stormed out of the hall.

Snape stepped forward, waved his wand, and the snake vanished in a small puff of black smoke. Snape, too, was looking at Harry in an unexpected way: It was a shrewd and calculating look, and Roselyn didn't like it. She was also aware of an ominous muttering all around the walls. She saw Ron and Hermione go up and tug on his shirt and pull him out of the Great Hall.

As they went through the doors, the people on either side drew away as though they were frightened of catching something. Roselyn didn't have a clue what was going on, she turned to Astoria with a frown on her face.

"Whats wrong? Why is everyone acting so weird?" several people turned to look at her funny, seeming to realize she was Harrys sister and several backed away from her nervously. Lockhart cleared his throat and said

"I think that will conclude todays lesson. Off to bed." The great hall emptied out, but Roselyn continued to stand there, looking at her friends, for Luna and Ginny had come over to join the other two.

"Harry's a Parselmouth." Astoria stated. Rosleyn blinked in confusion.

"A what? Does that mean talk to snakes?" She asked. The four girls nodded

"Yeah, it's really rare and Salazar Slytherin was famous for it. Its why our house symbol is a serpent." Astoria explained. Roselyn swallowed and looked between the three, Luna was the only one who didn't look grave. Ginny, who was looking pale again, continued.

" Now everyone's going to think you two are his great-great-grandchildren, which means you're the heir." Roselyn swallowed and looked between them. Suddenly she hopped that Mrs. Olgery wrote back with news about her family tree soon. She could already practically hear the rumors flying from this.

"I see. Let's go to bed." She said hastily changing the topic. Astoria and Ginny both gave her looks that she was unable to decipher at the moment before going off their separate ways.

Roselyn and Luna made their way up to their dorm in silence. Just before going to up to bed, Luna turned to her and said,

"I don't believe either you or Harry are Slytherin's Heir. Just because someone has an ability, it doesn't determine that they're good or bad. It's how they choose to use it that matters."." Before turning and going up to bed, leaving Roselyn to stare after her.

By next morning, the snow that had begun in the night had turned into a blizzard so thick that the last Herbology lesson of the term was cancelled: Professor Sprout wanted to fit socks and scarves on the Mandrakes, a tricky operation she would entrust to no one else, now that it was so important for the Mandrakes to grow quickly and revive Mrs. Norris and Colin Creevey.

Luckily, Roselyn's other classes went quickly so that she and Luna were able to spend the day, curled up by the fire, playing wizards chess. It was shortly after they started up their third game that Artemis flew through the window with an official looking letter. Roselyn started and stared at her owl, that was now sitting on the table, closest to the fire to warm up from being out in the snow. Roselyn quickly grabbed the letter

"Thanks Artemis. You're a good bird. Why don't you go up to the owlery and stay warm, alright?" Artemis let out a soft hoot, giving her hand a light peck before flying out again.

"What is it?" Luna asked. Roselyn looked down to read it.

Dear Miss Potter,

I'm pleased to inform you that we would be more than happy to trace your family's lineage. However, it will take us several weeks to do so. In the meantime, I would suggest you look into books about the ancient and most noble house of Black and Potter.

Sincerely,

Gena Olgery

Head of the Department of Geneology

Roselyn grinned and looked up to Luna

"Excellent. I'm going to go see if they have any books on this, do you want to come with me?" Luna stared at her thoughtfully for a moment before saying

"No, I think I shall go visit the house elves and drink some hot chocolate. It will be nice to visit with them before I go home." Roselyn nodded; she knew that Luna was very taken with the Kitchen's house elves.

"Then I'll be on my way." And the two girls parted ways. On her way to the library however she spotted Ginny curled up in a corner, her shoulders shaking, while crying. Roselyn paused, alarmed, before going over to her and crouching down.

"Ginny?" She asked quietly, Ginny gave a start, but continued to cry into her arms. "What's wrong Gin?" She tried again as she wrapped her arms around Ginny. Ginny just shook her head and continued to cry. After a few moments Ginny rubbed her eyes and sat up, forcing Roselyn to let go of her.

"I'm sorry Rose." She said quietly. Roselyn furrowed her eyebrows.

"For what?" Ginny shrugged and continued to sniffle. Roselyn pulled out one of her kerchiefs and handed it to her.

"Here, wipe your nose." Ginny took it with a quiet 'thanks' and wiped her tears away before wiping her nose and crinkling the kerchief in her fist. "Now, what's wrong? Do I need to hex someone for you?" Ginny laughed lightly and shook her head.

"No! you don't need to hex anyone. I just…" She trailed off, looking uncertain before shrugging again. "Don't worry about it Rose." Roselyn studied her for a moment before saying,

"I'm worried about you Ginny, you've been real pale lately and you haven't been like yourself. I know you said your homesick, but I think maybe that's not it, especially since most of your family is here." Ginny frowned and her eyes blazed for a moment.

"What do you care? You've been off doing who knows what with Harry, Ron, and Hermione and you've been hanging out with Astoria and Luna more than me!" Roselyn's eyes widened in surprise and she watched as Ginny closed her eyes and breathed in and held it before releasing her breath and calming down.

"I'm sorry Gin. I can't tell you what our brothers and Hermione are up to other than they wanted me to brew a potion for them and I know I hang out with the other two a lot but, you've been pulling away from us for a while. You're really not acting like yourself. I'm sorry if you feel like I've been neglecting you but I haven't been trying." Ginny looked sullen and upset again.

"I'm sorry Rose, I didn't mean to snap at you, I just, I haven't been feeling quite right lately." Roselyn nodded slowly, thinking about it.

"It's alright." They were both silent for a few moments before Rose stood up and held out a hand to help Ginny up. "How about you come with me to the library to find these two books I'm looking for. Mrs. Olgry from the Genealogy department contacted me and suggested them while I wait for them to look up some of my family tree." Ginny hesitated before taking her hand.

"Uh, sure, it's better than sitting here, that's for sure." Roselyn smiled hesitantly at her before leading the way to the library. Hopefully this would take both of their minds off of their troubles for awhile.


	12. Chapter 12

**Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, otherwise very many people would have lived, such as Remus... and Sirius... and Fred, defiantly Fred, and Dobby... anyways, i do own Rose.**

**Please Read and Review.**

Chapter 12:

As the two girls headed off to the library, Roselyn noticed that Neville was running over to them. She blinked and smiled at the older boy.

"Hey Neville! Whats up?" She asked. Ginny looked over to him, looking apprehensive. Roselyn looked at her strangely before looking closer at Neville's face. She herself started to feel apprehensive when she noticed that he was looking slightly afraid and panicked.

"Rose! Ginny! Have you heard?" He asked. Roselyn looked bewildered at him before shaking her head,

"Heard what?" She asked curiously. Neville grimaced

"There's been another attack, a double attack this time, on Justin Finch-Fletchly and Nearly Headless Nick! Not only that but Harry was at the crime scene and Professor McGonagall took him to see the Headmaster." Roselyn's eyes widened in horror as Ginny sucked in a gasp,

"But, what would be able to harm a ghost?" Ginny asked. Roselyn swallowed heavily

"Harry's not being blamed for it is he?" She asked desperately. Neville hesitated before shrugging

"I don't know. Of course people are going to say he's doing it, but I don't know if the teachers believe it." Roselyn felt like panicking, she didn't want her brother to be expelled. She turned to Ginny

"I gotta go see him. We can go to the library later okay?" she asked quickly, she didn't even wait for Ginny to answer before she turned and ran off down the hallway to where she knew the Headmasters office was. She had accidently run across it when she, Astoria, Luna, and Ginny had been exploring at the beginning of the year and was now glad that she had. She skidded to a halt in front of the gargoyle's and stared at it. She bit her lip as she tried to think of what the password might be. Luckily, she didn't have to stand their thinking for long because the gargoyles leapt aside to revile the stairs and door which, to her surprise, Hagrid was standing there, looking sheepish with a dead rooster in his hand, flung over his shoulder. He looked startled when he saw Roselyn standing there.

"Rosie! Wha-?" He didn't get to finish as Roselyn launched into her own questions

"Is Harry okay? Is he going to be expelled? Does Professor Dumbledore suspect him?" when she stopped, Hagrid had to smile sympathetically at her.

"So you heard huh? Don't worry, Dumbledore doesn't think Harry did it. He's just speaking with him right now before he lets him go." Roselyn closed her eyes and took a deep breath in relief.

"Oh, good." She made to turn and leave, now that she knew Harry wasn't in trouble when she paused and turned back to Hagrid. "Hagrid, why are you carrying a dead rooster around?" She asked. Hagrid looked to the rooster in his hand in surprise, seeming to have forgotten what he had been holding before answering.

"Oh, well, someone's been murdering the school roosters. I suspect it to be blood suckin' bugbears or foxes are getting them. I've come up to see if the headmaster can do anything." Roselyn nodded before flashing a smile and moving away.

"I see, well, hope you have a good rest of your day Hagrid. I'll see you later okay?" Hagrid nodded and Roselyn turned and walked away. She frowned as she wondered to herself what could be attacking the students and how they were petrifying them. Not to mention how they petrified a ghost.

The double attack on Justin and Nearly Headless Nick turned what had hitherto been nervousness into real panic.

Curiously, it was Nearly Headless Nick's fate that seemed to worry people most. What could possibly do that to a ghost? people asked each other; what terrible power could harm someone who was already dead?

There was almost a stampede to book seats on the Hogwarts Express so that students could go home for Christmas.

"At this rate, we'll be the only ones left," she had heard Ron tell Harry and Hermione. "Us, Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle. What a jolly holiday it's going to be."

Crabbe and Goyle, who always did whatever Malfoy did, had signed up to stay over the holidays, too. But Roselyn was glad that most people were leaving. She was tired of people skirting around Harry in the corridors, as though he were about to sprout fangs or spit poison; tired of all the muttering, pointing, and hissing as he passed.

Fred and George, however, found all this very funny.

They went out of their way to march ahead of Harry down the corridors, shouting, "Make way for the Heir of Slytherin, seriously evil wizard coming through. . . ."

Percy was deeply disapproving of this behavior.

"It is _not _a laughing matter," he said coldly.

"Oh, get out of the way, Percy," said Fred. "Harry's in a hurry."

"Yeah, he's off to the Chamber of Secrets for a cup of tea with his fanged servant," said George, chortling.

Ginny, to Roselyn's surprise, didn't find it amusing either.

"Oh, _don't,_" she wailed every time Fred asked Harry loudly who he was planning to attack next, or when George pretended to ward Harry off with a large clove of garlic when they met.

Roselyn, like Harry, didn't mind; it made her feel better that Fred and George so obviously thought it was a ridiculous idea.

But their antics seemed to be aggravating Draco Malfoy, who looked increasingly sour each time he saw them at it.

"It's because he's _bursting _to say it's really him," said Ron knowingly one day when they were working on the potion. "You know how he hates anyone beating him at anything, and you're getting all the credit for his dirty work."

"Not for long," said Hermione in a satisfied tone. "The Polyjuice Potion's nearly ready. We'll be getting the truth out of him any day now." To this Roselyn would sigh before just saying

"So you better start thinking of a strategy."

At last the term ended, and a silence deep as the snow on the grounds descended on the castle. Roselyn found it peaceful, rather than gloomy, and enjoyed the fact that she, Hermione, and the Weasleys had the run of Gryffindor Tower, which meant they could play Exploding Snap loudly without bothering anyone, and practice dueling in private. Fred, George, and Ginny had chosen to stay at school rather than visit Bill in Egypt with Mr. and Mrs. Weasley. Percy, who disapproved of what he termed their childish behavior, didn't spend much time in the Gryffindor common room. He had already told them pompously that _he _was only staying over Christmas because it was his duty as a prefect to support the teachers during this troubled time.

Christmas morning dawned, cold and white. Roselyn, who had been sleeping in Lavender Browns bed for the break, woke up extremely early. She looked over to Hermione and Ginny, who was sleeping in Pavarti Patel's bed, and saw that they were both sleeping. She grinned mischievously before getting up and taking a running leap onto Hermione's bed

"Wake up! Its Christmas!" she yelled in her ear before diving off the bed to doge Hermione's arm. She turned to Ginny and did the same thing to her.

"Merry Christmas!" she yelled. Ginny was so startled that she sat up quickly

"Wha-? What's going on?" She asked frantically as she looked around, before calming down when she saw it was only Roselyn. "Oh, it's only you." She then laid back down before sitting up again quickly and looking for her presents

"Awsome! Presents!" She said. The girls looked expectantly over to Hermione who only shrugged, gathered her presents up before heading out to go see Ron and Harry. Ginny and Roselyn quickly made their way through their presents.

Roselyn had received a Weasley sweater and fudge from Mrs. Weasley, a wizard's chess set from Luna, a very pretty silver necklace with a sapphire heart locket from Astoria, a book of curses from Hermione, a small blue diary from Ginny, and art pencils from Harry. Overall she was extremely pleased with the turnout of her presents.

After everyone had opened their presents and eaten breakfast, Roselyn and Ginny dragged the rest of the Weasleys, Harry, and Hermione out to the grounds to have a massive snowball fight.

"Okay, so it should be the Weasleys, minus Ron against the rest of us! That way the teams are even." Hermione said, obviously wanting everything to be fair, though no one objected.

"Perfect!" The twins said in unison.

"We'll get a –"

"Ten minute period –"

"To think of a strategy –"

"And make our forts." Fred and George said, pulling off the freaky twin thing.

"No magic!" Roselyn called to the other team as they walked away and started to build the forts.

"Okay, so should it be a free for all or should we come up with a plan?" Ron asked as he helped Roselyn create a pile of snow balls while Hermione and Harry built the walls of the fort.

"One of us should stay in the fort and keep our pile of snow balls stocked up, keep our walls up and to ambush anyone that comes around, two of us should be attacking everyone from between the two forts and one of us should ambush the other fort!" Roselyn said excitedly. The trio looked at her in amusement.

"Your not excited at all about this are you?" Harry teased her. Roselyn flushed and looked down at her snowball.

"I just wanna have fun." She mumbled. The other three laughed.

"I was just teasing Rose. That sounds good. How about you hold the fort, Ron and Hermione attack and I'll ambush okay?" He asked. Roselyn perked up and nodded excitedly.

"Okay! It's been ten minutes so lets get to it!" She said. The other three nodded and ran out, looking around so that they weren't snuck up on. Roselyn quickly grabbed several snowballs and peaked over the walls of her teams fort and started looking for the other red heads. She pretty quickly found Ginny who was trying to sneak over to where she was and started to throw the snowballs at her. Ginny gave a startled scream when one hit her on her shoulder, getting her face and neck when it splattered. Roselyn laughed and ducked when Ginny started to through some snow back at her, thus the epic fight started.

Roselyn was having a lot of fun catching the Weasley's with snowballs up until Fred managed to sneak past her whole team and bombarded her with snow.

"Ack! Mayday! Mayday! Help!" Roselyn tried to yell to her team mates while laughing hysterically and trying to hit Fred back. In the end Fred ended up tackling her, knocking down one of the walls on top of them and tickling her instead. This was the start of her teams downfall, because as soon as she was practically disabled from laughing, Hermione was ambushed by Ginny when her attention had been diverted by the call from help. Then when Ron and Harry turned to help her, George and Percy launched their attack and pretty soon Roselyn's whole team was soaked in snow.

It was only when Ron's stomach started growling, signaling meal time, that the group started to trudge in to get warmed up and head to Dinner.

The Great Hall looked magnificent. Not only were there a dozen frost-covered Christmas trees and thick streamers of holly and mistletoe crisscrossing the ceiling, but enchanted snow was falling, warm and dry, from the ceiling. Dumbledore led them in a few of his favorite carols, Hagrid booming more and more loudly with every goblet of eggnog he consumed. Percy, who hadn't noticed that Fred had bewitched his prefect badge so that it now read "Pinhead," kept asking them all what they were sniggering at. Roselyn sat at the Gryfindor table with Ginny, trying to ignore when Hermione started to usher Harry and Ron out of the Hall. She knew that they were doing the potion tonight but she had a bad feeling about the whole thing. She knew that she had made the potion correctly, so she didn't know why she was so worried, but she was so she tried to distract herself by talking to Ginny.

After they were done eating, Ginny turned to Roselyn and asked

"Do you want to play wizards chess?"

"Uh, I don't know how to play though." Roselyn said. Ginny shrugged and grabbed her new chess set she had gotten from a wizard cracker and led the way up to Gryffindor.

It took a bit of time, but after two games, Roselyn was pretty sure she understood the concept of the game. When she looked at the time, she was surprised to see that almost two hours had passed since she had seen her brother and his friends leave the Great Hall.

"I'm going to go see what Harry's up to before bed, do you want to come with me?" She asked Ginny. Ginny took a moment to think about it before finally shaking her head.

"No thanks. I think I'll write in my diary some then go to bed." She said as she started to pack her chess set up. Roselyn nodded and made her way out the portirate,

"Alright then. Good night." She said.

"Good night." Ginny replied before heading up to her dorm.

Roselyn swiftly made her way up to the bathroom. However, just as she reached the bathroom, Ron and Harry were coming out, coaxing Hermione out.

Suddenly she was apprehensive again,

"What happened? Did something go wrong?" The two boys spun around in surprise before looking uncertainly back into the bathroom where Hermione was,

"Uhh, ya, Hermione accidently used a cat hair, instead of Milicent's hair."

"Oh no! Hermione! We have to get you to the hospital wing!" Roselyn said, looking at them in horror.

"What will I do? What will I say?" She wailed as she stepped out of the bathroom. Roselyn had to force herself from cringing back from her. Her face was covered in black fur. Her eyes had turned yellow and there were long, pointed ears poking through her hair.

"It's okay, Hermione," said Harry quickly. "We'll take you up to the hospital wing. Madam Pomfrey never asks too many questions. . . ."

It took a long time to persuade Hermione to leave the bathroom. Especially with Moaning Myrtle making mean comments. When they finally made it to the Hospital wing, Madam Pomfrey gave a start when she saw Hermione,

"What in Merlins name happened to you?" She asked in surprise as she ushered her onto a bed.

"They were practicing some transfiguration spells and one sorta went awary and hit Hermione instead." Roselyn quickly explained, trying to come up with a reasonable lie before her brother tried to come up with a worse one. The nurse pursed her lips but nodded and started to get together some potions.

"Well, this wont be easy to fix my dear, I'm afraid your going to be in here for some time." She told Hermione,

"What about classes?" Hermione practically wailed. Roselyn patted the girls arm comfortingly as Harry and Ron shifted.

"Don't worry, I'll bring you all your homework okay?" She said. Hermione nodded.

"Out! All of you, this girl needs to take her potions and sleep" Madam Pomfrey said, shooing the three out.


	13. Chapter 13

**Disclaimer: Unfortunantly i don't own Harry Potter. I do own Roselyn**

Chapter 13

Hermione remained in the hospital wing for several weeks.

There was a flurry of rumor about her disappearance when the rest of the school arrived back from their Christmas holidays, because of course everyone thought that she had been attacked.

So many students filed past the hospital wing trying to catch a glimpse of her that Madam Pomfrey took out her curtains again and placed them around Hermione's bed, to spare her the shame of being seen with a furry face.

Roselyn would go visit her a few times every week to make sure she was doing okay and to take her finished homework so that they were sure that the teachers received it, since.

Every once and a while, Roselyn would show up at the same time as Harry and Ron and would ask what had happened in their interrogation of Malfoy.

"I don't suppose you've got any new leads?" she asked one day in a whisper, so that Madam Pomfrey couldn't hear her.

"Nothing," said Harry gloomily.

"I was so _sure _it was Malfoy," said Ron, for about the hundredth time, causing Roselyn to roll her eyes.

"What's that?" asked Harry, pointing to something gold sticking out from under Hermione's pillow.

"Just a get well card," said Hermione hastily, trying to poke it out of sight, but Ron was too quick for her. He pulled it out, flicked it open, and read aloud:

"_To Miss Granger, wishing you a speedy recovery, from your concernedteacher, Professor Gilderoy Lockhart, Order of Merlin, ThirdClass, Honorary Member of the Dark Force Defense League, and fivetimewinner of _Witch Weekly's _Most-Charming-Smile Award._"

Ron and Roselyn looked up at Hermione, disgusted.

"You sleep with this under your _pillow_?" He asked, but Hermione was spared answering by Madam Pomfrey sweeping over with her evening dose of medicine.

Roselyn sighed and said goodbye to everyone before heading off to the library. To her surprise, halfway there she heard someone calling her,

"Rose! Roselyn wait!" she turned and was astonished to see Ginny walking over to her with a bounce in her step. Roselyn smiled in delight, happy to see that the other girl was being happy for once.

"Hello Ginny. What has you in such a good mood?" she asked. Ginny just shrugged and smiled at her.

"Its just a good day. Wanna go to Hagrids with me?" she asked. Roselyn nodded eagerly

"Sure! I've been meaning to go visit him here soon. We should ask if we can count his coat pockets, I'm curious to know how many he has." Ginny nodded

"Okay. Lets go." Together they walked down to Hagrids, chatting happily about there classes and other things. When they got there they knocked.

"hullo?" Hagrid said as he opened the door, he smiled when he saw them, "Oh Ginny! Rosie, come on in." he said, standing aside so they could walk in. "How have you two been?" Roselyn smiled

"We've been good. We've come to say hi and see if we couldn't count the pockets in your coat." Hagrid laughed and grabbed his coat, placing it on the table.

"you're more than welcome to count the pockets, I've found that I cant remember how many I have anymore." He watched in amusement as Roselyn and Ginny gave each other gleeful smiles and start to count. He turned to Ginny and asked

"You feeling better Ginny? You're looking more perked up." Ginny smiled and nodded.

"Ya, I'm doing much better. Thanks for asking Hagrid." Hagrid nodded and moved to put the tea kettle on.

"you two wan' some tea?" the girls both nodded as they continued to count. The three of them then continued to spend the rest of the afternoon talking and counting pockets and telling stories until the girls had to go back inside.

"See you tomorrow Gin." Roselyn called to Ginny as the two parted ways so they could each head off to their respective common rooms.

The sun had now begun to shine weakly on Hogwarts again. Inside the castle, the mood had grown more hopeful. There had been no more attacks since those on Justin and Nearly Headless Nick, and Madam Pomfrey was pleased to report that the Mandrakes were becoming moody and secretive, meaning that they were fast leaving childhood.

"I bet they're just waiting to repot the Mandrakes." Neville explained to Roselyn during one of they're study sessions. She looked at him impatiently,

"But how long will that be? It's taking forever." She whined slightly. Neville just smiled and shrugged.

"As soon as their acne clears up, but it all depends on how long that will take." He said before starting to quiz her on some more plants.

"It must be getting riskier and riskier to open the Chamber of Secrets, with the school so alert and suspicious. Perhaps the monster was even now settling itself down to hibernate for another fifty years." Roselyn found herself saying hopefully to her friends shortly afterwards.

Ernie Macmillan of Hufflepuff didn't take this cheerful view. He was still convinced that Harry was the guilty one,that he had "given himself away" at the Dueling Club. Peeves wasn't helping matters; he kept popping up in the crowded corridors singing "Oh, Potter, you rotter . . ." now with a dance routine to match.

Gilderoy Lockhart seemed to think he himself had made the attacks stop. Harry had told her that he overheard him telling Professor McGonagall so while the Gryffindors were lining up for Transfiguration and that he thought they all needed a pick me up.

Lockhart's idea of a morale-booster became clear to everyone at breakfast time on February fourteenth.

Roselyn had been walking with Luna to Breakfast and when they opened the doors, they both paused thinking that they'd walked through the wrong doors.

The walls were all covered with large, lurid pink flowers. Worse still, heart-shaped confetti was falling from the pale blue ceiling.

The two of them walked over to the Ravenclaw table and Roselyn leaned over to ask Terry Boot

"What's going on?"

Terry threw Lockheart a disgusted look before turning to Roselyn

"Apparently Lockheart got permission from Dumbledore to celebrate Valentine's day. Roselyn looked up to see Lockhart, wearing lurid pink robes to match the decorations, was waving for silence. The teachers on either side of him were looking stony-faced. From where she sat, Roselyn could see a muscle going in Professor McGonagall's cheek.

Snape looked as though someone had just fed him a large beaker of Skele-Gro, not that Roselyn blamed him, she would too if she had to be that close to Lockhart.

"Happy Valentine's Day!" Lockhart shouted. "And may I thank the forty-six people who have so far sent me cards! Yes, I have taken the liberty of arranging this little surprise for you all — and it doesn't end here!" Lockhart clapped his hands and through the doors to the entrance hall marched a dozen surly-looking dwarfs.

Not just any dwarfs, however. Lockhart had them all wearing golden wings and carrying harps.

"My friendly, card-carrying cupids!" beamed Lockhart. "They will be roving around the school today delivering your valentines! And the fun doesn't stop here! I'm sure my colleagues will want to enter into the spirit of the occasion! Why not ask Professor Snape to show you how to whip up a Love Potion! And while you're at it, Professor Flitwick knows more about Entrancing Enchantments than any wizard I've ever met, the sly old dog!"

Professor Flitwick buried his face in his hands. Snape was looking as though the first person to ask him for a Love Potion would be force-fed poison.

Roselyn groaned as she caught up to Ginny who was looking thoughtful.

"Ginny!" Ginny turned to see her coming and smiled

"Oh, hey Rose. How are you." Roselyn scowled,

"I could be better. I wish Lockheart didn't do this. It's going to be so embarrassing for people." Ginny shrugged and with a small blush said

"I dunno Rose, I think it would be kinda romantic." Roselyn rolled her eyes.

"Whatever you say Gin. I better get to class. See you!" She said waving before heading off to class.

All day long, the dwarfs kept barging into their classes to deliver valentines, to the annoyance of the teachers, and it was in Herbology that a dwarf came up to her. She blushed under her classmates stares and professor Sprouts frown.

"Got a message for you miss. Potter." The dwarf cleared his throat then said, "Roses are red, violets are blue, candy is sweet, and so are you. From your admirer." The girls in the class all coo'd, causing Roselyn to sink down in her chair, luckily Professor Sprout took pity on her and brought the classes attention back to her so they could finish off their class.

After classes, Roselyn was glad to escape to the library where she was surprised to find Neville in their usual spot doing homework.

"Neville? What are you doing here?" she asked. Neville looked up, surprised, but when he saw it was her, he smiled

"Hi Rose. I'm just doing homework and trying to stay out of the way of those dwarves." Roselyn smiled and sat down.

"I know what you mean. One of them interrupted my Herbology class to give me one." Neville gave her a quick look that she couldn't decipher before looking back at his homework.

"Ya? What did it say?" He asked. Roselyn shrugged

"Roses are red, violets are blue, candy is sweet and so are you. It was really sweet, but I really wish I hadn't gotten it in the middle of class." She said, wrinkling her nose. "I really don't like being in the center of attention." She smiled over to Neville who smiled back his eyes twinkling in amusement.

"Well, at least what happened to you wasn't like what happened to Harry." He said. Roselyn looked at him curiously,

"Why? What happened?" She asked. He tried to stifle a laugh before saying

"Well, a dwarf stopped in-between classes by tripping him because Harry was trying to get away from him and sat down on his legs so he would stay put to recite the poem. And then Malfoy grabbed one of his books that looked like a diary before Harry disarmed him. It was all very dramatic." Roselyn stared at him opened mouthed before giggling.

"Oh no! and I bet I know exactly who sent him the valentine." She said, thinking of Ginny and how she had turned red when she said she thought it would be romantic to get or send a valentine. Neville just nodded before packing up his homework.

"Well, I have to go, I forgot my transfiguration book in my dorm and I need it to finish my homework." He said. Roselyn just smiled and stood up.

"I'll see you later then, I think I'm going to find Ginny." She said before they parted way's.

It took almost an hour before Roselyn found Ginny pacing anxiously near the lakes edge.

"What's wrong Ginny?" She asked. She raised an eyebrow when Ginny let out a startled shriek and spun around, looking at her wide eyed. Roselyn cocked her head as she studied the other red haired girl. "I'm sorry, didn't mean to scare you." She said. Ginny nodded, still looking pale and nervous about something.

"It's alright. I was just thinking and didn't hear you." She said. Roselyn nodded, frowning at her friend.

"Alright then, what were you thinking about?" She asked. Ginny shrugged her shoulders, but it was kind of a jerky movement.

"Oh nothing, just about earlier today." Roselyn nodded slowly.

"I see. Is it about Harry's valentine?" She asked. Ginny blushed scarlet and looked down at her feet. Roselyn smiled in slight amusement, glad to see her looing normal again. "Well, at least that will all blow over quickly. Want to hang out?" She asked. Ginny's eyes darted around nervously again before she nodded.

"Alright, don't have much else to do anyways." She said. Roselyn frowned, feeling slightly offended before shrugging it off.

"Alright then. Well, lets go for a walk, you look like you could use the fresh air." She suggested. Ginny nodded jerkily again and walked next to Roselyn as she started to make her way around the lake.

After the first ten minutes, Roselyn was happy to see that Ginny was starting to relax and have fun again. After two hours though the girls headed to the Great Hall for dinner before parting to go to their respective tables.

Roselyn listened half-halfheartedly to the other girls from her dorm gossip before heading off to bed. Half way there, she ran into Luna who had on a strange pair of glasses. She blinked and asked.

"What are the glasses for Luna?" Luna looked at her, or at least turned her head in Roselyn's direction and said.

"Oh, these help me to see Nargles. I was trying to find out information for Daddy's newest article in the Quibler that he want's to do about them. You don't seem to have any right now, but I'm off to see if Professor Lockheart does, he usually does." She said. Roselyn grimaced at the thought of Lockheart.

"Well, good luck with that. I'm going to bed. Good night Luna." She said before being on her way again.

The next day, before she was even able to get down to the Great Hall, she was accosted by her brother who came running over and grabbed her arm and yanked her into an empty classroom, calling a

"Just a minute Luna!" over their shoulders. When they were in the room Roselyn ripped her arm out of his grasp and frowned at him.

"What was that for?" She demanded. Harry made sure that no one could hear them before turning to her and saying,

"It was Hagrid who opened the chamber of secrets last time." He said softly to her. Roselyn's eyes widened in disbelief.

"Hagrid? How do you know? Did he tell you?" She asked urgently. Harry shook his head.

"No, I found this old diary that belonged to a Tom M. Riddle a couple of day's ago and I started to write in it and it wrote back! Then it pulled me into a type of memory and showed me!" He said. Roselyn frowned.

"You said it talked back to you? Where did you find it?" She asked him.

"Huh? Oh, Ron and I found it in Moaning Myrtles bathroom. Apparently someone tried to flush it down the toilet and it hit Myrtle who then flooded the bathroom which washed it back out. It took me some time to figure out how it work it but I finally noticed that it didn't have a bunch of ink that I spilled on it anymore and decided to try to write to it." Roselyn looked at him, startled.

"Harry! There was probably a reason someone tried to wash that book down the toilet! It might be dangerous." She said anxiously. Harry rolled his eyes.

"That's what Ron said, but nothing happened to me. And I did find out who opened the chamber last time." He pointed out.

"That's not the point Harry! What if it's something that effects you over time? Or what if Hagrid was framed? You should take it to Professor Dumbledore, Harry." She told him as she stomped her foot angrily. Harry frowned at her.

"I'm not going to keep using it! I don't write in diary's, that's a girly thing. And anyways, I don't need to use it anymore because I already found out what I needed to! Now Ron, Hermione and I just have to talk to Hagrid about it." Roselyn looked at him in disbelief.

"Talk to him about it? Well, good luck with that." She said shaking her head. "I'm going to Breakfast." She said before striding out the door. She grabbed Luna and practically dragged her down to the Great Hall.

"Are you alright Rose?" She asked. Roselyn hurumphed and sat down grumpily,

"I'm fine, but Harry's not going to be if he keeps being a prat." She said. They ate in silence for a little before Luna said,

"Well, at least we'll have Lockheart to take your mind of things today." Roselyn groaned

"Thanks for reminding me. I was almost able to purge him from my mind." She said before hitting her head on the table.


End file.
